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LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


B Y TEE SAME A VTHOB 

LEFT END EDWARDS 
LEFT TACKLE THAYER 


































































































































































































Well, 


come on! How did it 


(Pa«»e I t) 


happen?” 



















LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


By 

RALPH HENRY BARBOUR 

AUTHOR OP “THE CRIMSON SWEATER,” “LEFT END EDWARDS,” 
“LEFT TACKLE THAYER,” ETC. 


WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY 
E. C. CASWELL 



NEW YORK 

DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY 

PUBLISHERS 



Copyright, 1916 , by 
DODD, MEAD AND COMPANY, Inc. 



OCT -3 1916 


©Cl A437935 


CONTENTS 


CHAPTER 

I 

THE BOY FROM KANSAS 

• 

• 

• 

PAGE 

1 

II 

IN NUMBER SIX . 

• 

• 

• 

11 

III 

AMY HOLDS FORTH 

• 

• 


21 

IV 

THE FIRST GAME . 

• 

• 


35 

V 

DON GOES TO THE SECOND 




46 

VI 

THE SEARCH OF ADVENTURE 



58 

VII 

FIGHTING FIRE 




71 

VIII 

COACHING THE TACKLES 




85 

IX 

THE WIDTH OF A FINGER 

' 



103 

X 

TIM EXULTS AND EXPLAINS 




118 

XI 

MR. BRADY FORGETS 




128 

XII 

THE JOKE ON MR. MOLLER 




139 

XIII 

SOUTHBY YIELDS . 




155 

XIV 

WALTON WRITES A NOTE 




166 

XV 

A PROPOSITION 




177 

XVI 

DON VISITS THE DOCTOR 




186 

XVII 

DROPPED FROM THE TEAM 




195 

XVIII 

11 GOOD-BYE, TIMMY ! ’ ’ . 




206 

XIX 

FRIENDS FALL OUT 




216 

XX 

AMY APPEARS FOR THE DEFENCE 



231 

XXI 

THE DOCTOR TELLS A STORY 




247 

XXII 

COACH ROBEY IS PUZZLED 




260 

XXIII 

CROSS-EXAMINATION 




268 

XXIV 

‘ 1 ALL READY, BRIMFIELD ? 19 




277 

XXV 

TIM GOES OVER 




289 

XXVI 

LEFT GUARD GILBERT . 




300 






ILLUSTRATIONS 


“ Well, Come On ! How Did It Happen ? ” 

(Page 14). Frontispiece 

FACING 

PAGE 

Finally, Don Was Unceremoniously Yanked 
Up and Through.90 

66 Will You Unlock That Door? 99 Demanded 

Don Angrily.224 

The Runner Smashed into Sight, Wild-faced 
for an Instant Before He Put His Head 
down and Charged In.306 
























































LEFT GUARD GILBERT 




j 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


CHAPTER I 

THE BOY FROM KANSAS 


“Hold up!” 

Coach Robey, coatless, vestless, hatless, his old 
flannel trousers held up as by a miracle with the 
aid of a leather strap scarcely deserving the name 
of belt, pushed his way through the first squad 
players. The Brimfield Head Coach was a wiry, 
medium-sized man of about thirty, with a deeply- 
tanned face from which sharp blue eyes looked 
out under whitish lashes that were a shade lighter 
than his eyebrows and two shades lighter than 
his sandy hair. As the afternoon was excessively 
hot, even for the twenty-first day of September 
and in proximity to Long Island Sound, Mr. 
George Robey’s countenance was bathed in per¬ 
spiration and the faded blue silk shirt was plas¬ 
tered to his body. 

“That was left half through guard-tackle, 
wasn’t it? Then don’t put the ball in your arm, 
St. Clair. You ought to know better than that, 
l 


2 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


On plays through the line hold it against your 
stomach with both hands. How long do you think 
you’d keep that ball in your elbow after you hit 
the line? Someone would knock it out in about 
one second! Now try it again and think what 
you’re doing. All right, Carmine. Same play.” 

The panting and perspiring backs crouched once 
more, Carmine shrilly called his signals, Thayer 
and Gatferty plunged against an imaginary foe 
as Thursby shot the ball back and St. Clair, hug¬ 
ging the pigskin ecstatically with wide-spread 
fingers, trotted through the hole, stopped, set the 
ball on the grass and wiped his streaming face 
with the torn sleeve of a maroon jersey. 

“All right,” said the coach. “That will do for 
today. In on the trot, everyone!” 

The first squad, exhaling a long, deep sigh of 
relief as one man, set their faces toward the gym¬ 
nasium and trotted slowly off, their canvas-clad 
legs swish-swashing as they met. Coach Robey 
walked further down the sun-baked field to where 
the nearer of the remaining four squads was at 
work. 

“Oh, put some pep into it, McPhee!” called the 
coach as he approached. “You all look as if you 
were asleep! Come on now! Wake up! Jones, 
get up there. You’re away out of position. That’s 


THE BOY FROM KANSAS 


3 


better. Now then, Quarter! Hold up! What’s 
your down?” 

“Third, sir, and four to go.” 

“All right. Show me what you’re going to do 
with it. Head up, Martin! Look where you’re 
going.” 

“36—27—43—86!” grunted the quarter-back. 
“36-” 

“Signal!” cried Gordon, at right half. 

McPhee straightened, cast a withering look at 
the half-back, wiped the perspiration from the end 
of his sun-burnt nose and repeated: 

“36—27—43-” 

Gordon shifted his feet, and— 

“Hold up!” barked the coach. “Gordon, don’t 
give the play away. Shifting your feet like that 
makes it a cinch for the other fellow. Get your 
position now and hold it until the ball’s passed. 
All right. Once more, Quarter.” 

“36—27—43—86!” wailed McPhee. “36— 
27-” 

The pigskin shot into his waiting hands, Gor¬ 
don leaped forward, took it at a hand-pass and 
ran out behind his line, left half in advance, turned 
sharply in and set the ball down. 

“First down!” called McPhee. “Sturges 

yy 


over. 




4 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“Hold up! Try a forward pass, McPhee. 
You’re on the ten yards and it’s third down. Get 
into this, you ends. Put some pep into it!” 

“Signal! Martin back! 37—32—14—71- 
Hep!” The backs jumped to the left one stride. 
“37—32-” 

Back flew the ball to the full-back, right end 
shot out and down the field across the mythical 
last line, the defence surged against the imaginary 
enemy and Martin, poising the ball at arm’s 
length, threw over the line to Lee. 

4 ‘ All right, ’ ’ commented the coach. ‘ i That ’ll be 
all for today. Trot all the way in, fellows. ’ ’ 

Five minutes later the field was empty of the 
sixty-odd boys who had reported for the second 
day’s practice and the sun was going down behind 
the tree-clad hill to the west. In the gymnasium 
was the sound of rushing water, of many voices 
and of scraping benches. Mr. Robey wormed his 
way through the crowded locker-room to where 
Danny Moore, the trainer, stood in the doorway 
of the rubbing-room in talk with Jim Morton, this 
year’s manager of the team. Morton was nine¬ 
teen, tall, thin and benevolent looking behind a 
pair of rubber-rimmed spectacles. 

“Did you put them on the scales, Dan?” asked 
the coach. 


THE BOY FROM KANSAS 


5 


“Sure, the first, second and third, sir. Some 
of ’em dropped a good three pounds today. By 
gorry, I feel like I’d dropped that much meself!” 

“It certainly is warm. Look here, Jim, is this 
all we get to work on? How many were out to¬ 
day?” 

“Sixty-two, Coach. That’s not bad. I suppose 
there ’ll be a few more dribble along tomorrow and 
the next day. ’ ’ 

“ Well, they look pretty fair, don’t you think? 
Some of the new fellows seem to have ideas of 
football. All the last year fellows on hand?” 

“All but Gilbert. He hasn’t shown up. I don’t 
know why, I’m sure.” 

‘‘ Better look him up, ’ ’ said the coach. ‘ ‘ Gilbert 
ought to make a pretty good showing this year, 
and we aren’t any too strong on guards.” 

“Gilbert rooms with Tim Otis, I think,” replied 
Morton. “Oh, Tim! Tim Otis!” 

A light-haired boy of seventeen, very straight, 
and very pink where an enormous bath-towel 
failed to cover him, wormed his way to them. 

“Say, Tim, what’s the matter with Gilbert?” 
asked Morton. “Isn’t he coming out?” 

Tim Otis shrugged a pair of broad, lean shoul¬ 
ders. “He hasn’t got here yet, Morton. I don’t 
know what’s happened. He wrote me two weeks 


6 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


ago that he’d meet me at the station in New 
York yesterday for the three-fifty-eight, but he 
wasn’t there and I haven’t heard a word from 
him. ’ ’ 

“Probably missed his connection,” suggested 
Morton. “He lives out West somewhere, 
doesn’t he?” 

“Yes, Osawatomie, Kansas.” 

“It probably takes a good while to get away 
from a place with a name like that,” said 
Mr. Robey drily. “Well, when he shows up, 
Otis, tell him to get a move on if he wants a 
place. ’ ’ 

“Yes, sir, I will. I’m pretty certain he will be 
along today some time. I wouldn’t be surprised if 
he was here now. ’ ’ 

“All right. By the way, Otis, how do you feel 
at right half ? Seem strange to you ? ’ ’ 

“No, sir, I don’t notice it. I did play right, you 
know, two years ago on the second. Seems to me 
it’s easier to take the ball from that position, too.” 

“Well, don’t try the fool trick your side-partner 
did today,” said Mr. Robey, smiling. “Putting 
the ball under your elbow for a line plunge is a 
fine piece of business for a fellow who’s been play¬ 
ing three years!” 

Tim laughed. “I guess he did that because it 


THE BOY FROM KANSAS 7 

was just practice, sir. He knows a lot better than 
to do it in scrimmage.” 

“I hope so. Well, hurry Gilbert along, will 
you? If he doesn’t get out here inside of a few 
days he won’t find much of a welcome, I’m afraid. 
I’m not going to keep positions open for anyone 
this year, not with the first game coming along in 
four days!” 

“Don’t you worry, Mr. Robey,” replied Tim, 
with a chuckle and a flash of white teeth. “I’ll 
have him out here the first day he shows up, 
even if I have to lug him all the way. Don’t 
think I’ll have to, though, for you couldn’t 
keep Don from playing football unless you tied 
him up!” 

“Nice chap,” commented Morton, nodding at 
Tim as the latter returned to his bench. ‘ 1 Awfully 
clean-cut sort. ’ ’ 

“A fine lad,” agreed Danny Moore, and Mr. 
Robey nodded thoughtfully. 

“I don’t believe we’re going to miss Kendall 
and Freer as much as I thought,” he said after 
a moment. “Otis looks to me like a fellow who 
will stand a lot of work and grow on it. Well, I’m 
going to get a shower and get out of this sweat- 
box. As soon as you get time, Jim, I wish you’d 
catalogue the players the way we did last year and 


8 LEFT GUARD GILBERT 

let me have the list. You know how Black did it, 
don’t you?” 

“Yes, sir. I’ll have the list ready for you to¬ 
morrow. ’ ’ 

‘ ‘ Good! Got a towel I can use, Dan ? I haven’t 
brought any yet. Thanks.” The coach nodded 
and sought a place to disrobe. The trainer’s gaze 
followed him until he was lost to sight beyond the 
throng. 

“I wonder will he put it over again this year,” 
he mused. 

“Surest thing you know,” asserted Morton. 
“Think I’m going to have the team licked the year 
I’m manager, Danny? Not so you’d notice it!” 

“Well, between you and him,” chuckled Danny, 
“I’ve no doubt you’ll turn out a fine team. Say, 
he’s the lad that can do it, though, now ain’t he? 
Four years he’s been at it, and it’s fifty-fifty now, 
ain’t it?” 

“Yes, we lost the first two years and won last 
year and the year before. It was Andy Miller’s 
team that started the ball rolling for us. No one 
could have won those first two years, anyhow, 
Danny. Robey had to start at the bottom and 
build up the whole thing. We* hadn’t been play¬ 
ing football here for several years before that. It 
takes a couple of years at the least to get a foun- 


THE BOY FROM KANSAS 


9 


dation laid. If we win this year we ’ll have some¬ 
thing to boast of. No other team ever beat 
Claflin three times rnnning. ,, 

4 ‘Maybe we won’t either. I’m hoping we do, 
though. Still and all, it don’t do to win too many 
times. You get to thinking you can’t lose, d’ye 
see, and the first thing anyone knows you’re all 
shot to pieces. I’ve seen it happen, me boy.” 

“Oh, I dare say, Danny, but don’t let’s start the 
losing streak until next year. I want to manage 
a winning team. Well, so long. See about some 
cooler weather tomorrow, will you?” 

“I will so,” replied the little trainer gravely. 
“I’ll start arrangements to once.” 

Meanwhile Tim Otis, again arrayed in grey 
flannels and a pair of tan, rubber-soled shoes 
rather the worse for a hard summer, was on his 
way along the Row to the last of the five build¬ 
ings set end to end on the brow of the hill. As he 
swung in between Wendell and Torrence—the 
gymnasium stood behind Wendell, and, save for 
the Cottage, as the principal’s residence was 
called, was the only building out of alignment— 
he saw the entrances to dormitories and Main Hall 
thronged with youths who evidently preferred the 
coolness of outdoors to the heat of the rooms, 
while others were seated on the grass along the 


10 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


walk. It almost seemed that the entire roster of 
some one hundred and eighty students was before 
him. He answered many hails, but declined all 
inducements to tarry, keeping on his way past 
Main Hall and Hensey until Billings was reached. 
There he turned in and tramped to the right along 
the first floor corridor to the open door of Number 
6, a room on the back of the building that looked 
out upon the tennis courts and, beyond, the foot¬ 
ball and baseball fields. From the fact that no 
sound came from the room, Tim decided that Don 
Gilbert had, after all, and in spite of what Tim 
called a “hunch,” failed to arrive. But when he 
entered his mistake was instantly apparent. A 
maroon-coloured cushion hurtled toward him, nar¬ 
rowly missing the green shade of the drop-light 
on the study table and, thanks to prompt and in¬ 
stinctive action on the part of Tim, sailed on, 
serene and unimpeded, into the corridor. Where¬ 
upon Tim uttered a savage whoop of mingled joy 
and vengeance and, traversing the length of the 
room in four leaps, hurled himself upon, the occu¬ 
pant of the window-seat. 


CHAPTEE II 


IN NUMBER SIX 

For a long minute confusion and tlie noise of 
battle reigned supreme. Then, in response to a 
sudden yelp of pain from Don, Tim drew off, pant¬ 
ing and grinning. Don was extending a left hand, 
funereally wrapped in a black silk handkerchief, 
further along the window-seat and away from the 
scene of action. 

“Hello!” said Tim. “What’s the matter with 
that?” 

“Hurt it a little,” replied Don. 

“Well, I supposed you had, you idiot! How? 
Hit it against your head?” 

The other smiled in his slow fashion. “We had 
a sort of a wreck coming on. Out in Indiana some¬ 
where. I got this. That’s why I’m behind 
time.” 

“I’m beastly sorry, old man! I didn’t notice 
the crepe. Did I hurt it much ? ’ ’ 

“No. I yelled so you wouldn’t. Preparedness, 
you know. Safety first and so on. It isn’t much. 
How’s everything here ? ’ ’ 

11 


12 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


Tim seated himself at the other end of the seat, 
took his knees in his hands, and beamed. 

6 ‘ Oh, fine! Say, I’m tickled to death to see your 
ugly mug again, Don. You aren’t a bit hand¬ 
somer, are you?” 

“I’ve been told I was. Trouble with you is, you 
don’t recognise manly beauty when you see it.” 

“Oh, don’t I?” Tim twirled an imaginary 
moustache. “I recognise it every time I look 
in the glass! Well, how are you aside from the 
bum fist?” 

“Great! I’ve just had a seance with Josh. I 
tried to register and sneak by, but Brooke 
wouldn’t have it that way. ‘Er, quite so, Gil¬ 
bert, quite so, but I—er—think you had better 
see Mr. Fernald.’ So I did, and Josh read me 
the riot act. Thought for awhile he was going 
to send me home again.” 

“But didn’t you tell him your train was 
wrecked?” 

“Yes, but he didn’t believe in it much. 
Thought I was romancing, I guess. Got a rail¬ 
way guide and showed me how I might have got 
here on time just the same. Maybe he’s right, 
but I couldn’t figure it out in Cincinnati. Be¬ 
sides, I didn’t get away with much of anything 
besides pajamas and overcoat and shoes, and so 


IN NUMBER SIX 


13 


I had to refit. That lost me the first connection 
and then I got held np again at Pittsburg. So 
here I am, the late Mr. Gilbert.” 

“Josh is an idiot/’ said Tim disgustedly. 
“Didn’t he see your hand? How did he think you 
did that if you weren’t in a wreck?” 

“Oh, I kept that in my pocket and I guess he 
didn’t notice it. He came around all right in the 
end, though. We parted friends. At least, I did. ’ ’ 

“Well, what about that?” Tim nodded at the 
injured hand. “How’d you cut you, burn you?” 

“Yes. Things got on fire.” 

“You’re the most vivid descriptionist I ever 
listened to! Come across with the sickening de¬ 
tails. How did it happen? I didn’t see anything 
about it in the papers.” 

“Probably wasn’t on the sporting page,” re¬ 
plied Don gravely. 

“Oh, dry up and blow away! Wasn’t it in the 
papers?” 

“Cincinnati papers had it. I haven’t read the 
others. It wasn’t much of a wreck really. En¬ 
gineer killed, fireman scalded, about twenty pas¬ 
sengers injured more or less. Several considerably 
more. Express messenger expected to pass out. 
Just a nice, cosy little wreck with no—no spectac¬ 
ular features, as you might say.” 


14 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


‘ 4 Well, come on! How did it happen V 9 

“Freight train taking a siding and went to sleep 
at it. Onr engine bumped the other engine and 
they both went smash. Hot coals and steam and 
so on got busy. It was about five in the morning. 
Just getting lightish. Everyone snuggled up in 
bed. Biff! Wow! I landed out on the floor on my 
hands and knees. Everyone yelled. Car turned 
half over and sat that way. Doors got jammed. 
We beat it out by the windows. I was a Roman 
Senator with a green berth curtain wrapped about 
me. Afterwards I sneaked back and pulled out my 
shoes and overcoat. Always sleep with my shoes 
under my pillow, you see. Good idea, too. If I 
hadn’t had them there I’d never have got them. 
Couldn’t get my bag out. Car was on fire by that 
time. Three others, too. They saved all but the 
one I was in and the express and baggage cars. 
After awhile a wrecking train came and then a lot 
of us walked to a village about a mile and a half 
away and had breakfast and went on to Cincin¬ 
nati about noon.” 

‘‘Gee! But, still, you know, I don’t see how you 
got burned.” 

“Well, things were pretty hot. Some of them 
got burned a lot worse than I did. Had to pull 
some of them out the windows and through the 


IN NUMBER SIX 


15 


roofs. Women, too. Lucky thing our car had only 
two in it. Two women, I mean. Things were 
fairly busy for awhile.’’ 

6 1 Must have been. The engineer was killed 
straight off, eh?” 

“Ours was. The other one managed to jump. 
Firemen got off all right, too. The other fireman. 
Ours got caught and scalded like the dickens. Saw 
the engineer myself.” Don frowned and shud¬ 
dered. “Nasty mess he was, too, poor fellow. 
Let’s talk about something else. I don’t like to 
remember that engineer.” 

“Too bad! But, say, you were lucky, weren’t 
you? You might have been killed, I suppose.” 

‘‘ Might have, maybe. Didn’t come very near it, 
though. First wreck I ever saw and don’t want 
to see any more. Funny thing, though, I didn’t 
mind it at all until I was on the train going to 
Cincinnati. Excitement, I suppose. Then I came 
near keeling over, honest! What do you know 
about that, Timmy?” 

“I guess anyone would have. How bad is your 
burn?” 

“Not bad. Hurts a bit, though. It’s the inside 
of the fingers and the palm. It’ll be all right in a 
few days, I guess. Doctor chap said I’d have to 
have it dressed every day for awhile.” 


16 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“But, Great Scott, Don, what about football?” 

“I’ve thought of that. Nothing doing for a 
week or so, I guess. Rotten luck, eh?” 

“Beastly! And Robey was telling me only half 
an hour ago to hurry you up. Said you’d have to 
come right out if you wanted a place. Still, when 
he understands what the trouble is-” 

“I’ll see him tonight, I guess. Who’s playing 
guard, Tim?” 

“Joe Gafferty, left; Tom Hall, right. Walton 
and Pryme and Lawton are all after places. Wal¬ 
ton’s been doing good work too, I think.” 

“All the fellows back?” 

“Every last one. Remember Howard, who 
played sub half-back for the second last year? 
He’s showing great form. Still, you can’t tell 
much yet. There’s to be scrimmage tomorrow. 
We play Thacher Saturday, you know. Sort of 
quick work and I don’t believe we’ll be anywhere 
near ready for them.” 

“ Thacher’s easy. We beat them 26 to 3 last 
year.” 

“Twenty-three to three.” 

“Twenty-six.” 

‘ ‘ Twenty-three. Bet you! ’ ’ 

“I don’t bet, Timmy. Know I’m right, though. 
Anyway, Thacher’s easy. Tell me the news.” 


IN NUMBER SIX 


17 


“Oh, there isn't anything startling. We had 
the usual polite party at Josh's last night. Shook 
hands with the new chaps and told 'em how tickled 
we were to see them. Ate sandwiches and cake 
and lemonade and—by the way, we've got a new 
master; physics; Moller his name is; Caleb Moller, 
B.A. Quite a handsome brute and a swell dresser. 
Comes from Lehigh or one of those Southern col¬ 
leges, I believe." 

“Lehigh's in Pennsylvania, you ignoramus." 

“Is it!" answered Tim untroubledly. “All 
right. Let it stay there. Anyhow, Caleb is some 
cheese.'' 

“Where's Rollinson gone?" 

“Don't know what happened to Rollo. Draper 
said he heard he'd gone to some whopping 
big prep school up in New Hampshire or some¬ 
where." 

“Or some other Southern school," suggested 
Don soberly. 

‘ ‘ Dry up! And, say, get a move on. It's nearly 
time for eats and I'm starved." 

“Timmy, I never saw the time you weren't 
starved. All right. I'm sort of hungry myself. 
Haven't had anything since about ten o'clock this 
morning. Ran out of money. Got here with eight 
cents in my pocket. That and my tuition check. 


18 LEFT GUARD GILBERT 

I’d have cashed that if I could have and had a 
dinner. I was sure hungry! ’ 9 

“Well, wash your dirty face and hands,” said 
Tim, “and come along. Oh, say, Don, wait till you 
see the classy Norfolk suit I’ve got. I enticed 
dad into Crook’s when we struck the city; told him 
I had to have some hankies and ties, you know. 
Then I steered him up against this here suit, and 
this here suit made a hit with him right away. 
If he could have got into it himself he’d have 
walked out in it. It’s sort of green with a reddish 
thread wandering carelessly through it. It’s some 
apparel, take it from me.” 

“Maybe I will if it fits me,” responded Don. 

“Will what?” 

4 ‘ Take it from you. ’ ’ 

“Gee, but you ’re bright! Getting wrecked’s put 
an edge on you, sonny. I’m afraid that suit 
wouldn’t fit you, though, Don. You’ve grown 
about an inch since Spring, haven’t you? You’re 
beastly fat, too.” 

“I am not,” denied Don, good-humouredly in¬ 
dignant. “I’ve kept in strict training all summer. 
What you think is fat is good hard muscle, Timmy. 
Feel of that arm if you don’t believe it.” 

“Yes, quite village-blacksmitliy.” 

“Quite what?" 


IN NUMBER SIX 


19 


“Village-blacksmithy. ‘The muscles of his 
mighty arms were strong as iron bands/ or some¬ 
thing like that. Get out of the way and let me 
wash up.” 

Don retired to his dresser and passed the 
brushes over his brown hair and snugged his tie 
up a bit. The face that looked back at him from 
the mirror was not, perhaps, handsome, although 
it by no means merited Tim’s aspersions. There 
was a nice pair of dark brown eyes, rather slum¬ 
berous looking, a nose a trifle too short for per¬ 
fection and a mouth a shade too wide. But it was 
a good-tempered, pleasant face, on the whole, in¬ 
telligent and capable and matching well the physic¬ 
ally capable body below, a body of wide shoulders 
and well-knit muscles and a deep chest that might 
have belonged to a youth of eighteen instead of 
seventeen. Compared with Tim Otis, who was of 
the same age, Don Gilbert suffered on only two 
counts—quickness and vivacity, Tim, well-mus¬ 
cled, possessed a litheness that Don could never 
attain to, and moved, thought and spoke far more 
quickly. In height Don topped his friend by 
almost a full inch and was broader and bigger- 
boned. They were both, in spite of dissimilarity, 
fine, manly fellows. 

Tim, wiping his hands after ablutions, turned to 


20 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


survey Don with a quizzical smile on his good- 
looking face. And, after a moment’s reflective re¬ 
gard of his chum’s broad back, he broke the 
silence. 

“Say, Don,” he asked, “glad to get back?” 

Don turned, while a slow smile crept over his 
countenance. 

“ Su-u-re he drawled. 


CHAPTER III 


AMY HOLDS FOETH 

Brimfield Academy is at Brimfield, and Brim- 
field is a scant thirty miles out of New York City 
and some two or three miles from the Sound. It is 
more than possible that these facts are already 
known to you; if you live in the vicinity of New 
York they certainly are. But at the risk of being 
tiresome I must explain a little about the school 
for the benefit of those readers who are unac¬ 
quainted with it. Brimfield was this Fall enter¬ 
ing on its twenty-fifth year, a fact destined to be 
appropriately celebrated later on. The enrol¬ 
ment was one hundred and eighty students and 
the faculty consisted of twenty members inclusive 
of the principal, Mr. Joshua L. Fernald, A.M., 
more familiarly known as “Josh.” The course 
covers six years, and boys may enter the First 
Form at the age of twelve. Being an endowed 
institution and well supplied with money under 
the terms of the will of its founder, Brimfield 
boasts of its fine buildings. There are four dormi¬ 
tories, Wendell, Torrence, Hensey and Billings, 
21 


22 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


all modern, and, between Torrence and Hensey, 
the original Academy Building now known as 
Main Hall and containing the class rooms, school 
offices, assembly room and library. The dining 
hall is in Wendell, the last building on the right. 
Behind Wendell is the gymnasium. Occupying 
almost if not quite as retiring a situation at the 
other end of the Row, is the Cottage, Mr. Fer- 
nald’s residence. Each dormitory is ruled over 
by a master. In Billings Mr. Daley, the in¬ 
structor in modern languages, was in charge at 
the period of this story, and since it was necessary 
to receive permission before leaving the school 
grounds after supper, Don and Tim paused at Mr. 
Daley’s study on the way out. Don’s knock on 
the portal of Number 8 elicited an instant invita¬ 
tion to enter and a moment later he was shaking 
hands with the hall master, a youngish man with 
a pleasant countenance and a manner at once 
eager and embarrassed. Mr. Daley was usully 
referred to as Horace, which was his first name, 
and, as he shook hands, Don very nearly commit¬ 
ted the awful mistake of calling him that! After 
greetings had been exchanged Don explained 
somewhat vaguely the reason for his tardy ar¬ 
rival and then requested permission to visit 
Coach Robey in the village after supper. 


AMY HOLDS FORTH 


23 


“ Yes, Gilbert, but—er—be back by eight, please. 
I’m not sure that Mr. Robey isn’t about school, 
however. Have you inquired?” 

“No, sir, but Tim says he isn’t eating in hall 
yet, and so-” 

“Ah, in that case perhaps not. Well, be back 
for study hour. If you’re going to supper I’ll 
walk along with you, fellows.” Mr. Daley closed 
his study door and they went out together and, 
as they trod the flags of the long walk that passed 
the fronts of the buildings, Mr. Daley discoursed 
on football with Tim while Don replied to the 
greetings of friends. They parted from the in¬ 
structor at the dining hall door and sought their 
places at table, Don’s arrival being greeted with 
acclaim by the other half-dozen occupants of the 
board. Once more he was obliged to give an ac¬ 
count of himself, but this time his narrative was 
considered to be sadly lacking in detail and it was 
not until Tim had come to his assistance with a 
highly coloured if not exactly authentic history of 
the train-wreck that the audience was satisfied. 
Don told him he was an idiot. Tim, declining to 
argue the point, revenged himself by stealing a 
slice of Don’s bread when the latter’s attention 
was challenged by Harry Westcott at the farther 
end of the table. 



24 


LEFT GUAED GILBERT 


Westcott, who was one of the editors of the 
school monthly, The Review, had developed the 
journalistic instinct to a high degree of late and had 
visions of a thrilling story in the November issue. 
But Don utterly refused to pose as a hero of any 
sort. The best Harry could get out of him was 
the acknowledgement that he had seen several 
persons removed from the wreck and had helped 
carry one to the relief train later. That wasn’t 
much to go on, and, subsequently, Harry regret¬ 
fully abandoned his plan. 

After supper Don and Tim walked down to the 
village and Don had a few minutes of talk with 
the coach. Mr. Robey was sympathetic but an¬ 
noyed. Although he didn’t say so in so many 
words he gave Don to understand that he had 
failed in his duty to the school and the team in 
allowing himself to become concerned in a train- 
wreck. He didn’t explain just how Don could 
have avoided it, and Don didn’t think it worth 
while to inquire. 

“You have that hand looked after properly and 
regularly, Gilbert,” he said, “and watch prac¬ 
tice until you can put on togs. Losing a week or 
so is going to handicap you. No doubt about that. 
And I’m not making any promises. But you keep 
your eyes open and maybe there’ll be a place for 


AMY HOLDS FORTH 25 

you when you ’re ready to work. It’s awfully hard 
luck, old chap. See you tomorrow. ’ ’ 

Don went back to school through the warm dusk 
slightly cast down, although he had previously 
realised that football would be beyond him for at 
least a week. It is sometimes one thing to ac¬ 
knowledge a fact oneself and another to hear the 
same fact stated by a second person. There’s a 
certain finality about the latter that is convincing. 
But if Don was downcast he didn’t show it to his 
companion. Don had a way of concealing his emo¬ 
tions that Tim at once admired and resented. 
When Tim felt blue—which was mighty seldom— 
he let it be known to the whole world, and when he 
felt gay he was just as confiding. But Don—well, 
as Tim often said, he was “worse than an 
Indian!” 

After study they sallied forth again, arm in arm, 
and went down the Row to Torrence and climbed 
the stairs to Number 14. As the door was half 
open knocking was a needless formality—espe¬ 
cially as the noise within would have prevented its 
being heard—and so Tim pushed the portal fur¬ 
ther ajar and entered, followed by Don, on a most 
animated scene. Eight boys were sprawled or 
seated around the room, while another, a thin, tall, 
unkempt youth with a shock of very black hair 


26 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


which was always falling over his eyes and being 
brushed aside, was standing in a small clearing 
between table and windows balancing a baseball 
bat, surmounted by two books and a glass of water, 
on his chin. So interested was the audience in 
this startling feat that the presence of the new 
arrivals passed unnoted until the juggler, sud¬ 
denly stepping back, allowed the law of gravity 
to have its way for an instant. Then his right 
hand caught the falling bat, the two books crashed 
unheeded to the floor and his left hand seized the 
descending tumbler. Simultaneously there was a 
disgruntled yelp from Jim Morton and a howl of 
laughter from the rest of the audience. For the 
juggler, while he had miraculously caught the 
tumbler in mid-air, had not been deft enough to 
keep the contents intact and about half of it had 
gone into the football manager’s face. However, 
everyone there except Morton applauded enthu¬ 
siastically and hilariously, and Larry Jones, 
sweeping his offending locks aside with the care¬ 
less and impatient grace of a violin virtuoso, 
bowed repeatedly. 

“Great stuff,” approved Amory Byrd, rescu¬ 
ing his books from the floor. “Do it again and 
stand nearer Jim.” 

“If he does it again I’m going into the hall,” 


AMY HOLDS FORTH 


27 


said Morton disgustedly, wiping his damp coun¬ 
tenance on the edge of Clint Thayer’s bedspread. 
“ You ’re a punk juggler, Larry.” 

“All right, you do it,” was the reply. Larry 
proffered the bat and tumbler, but Morton waved 
them indignantly aside. 

‘ 4 1 don’t do monkey-tricks, thanks. Gee, my col¬ 
lar ’s sopping wet! ’ ’ 

“Oh, that’s all right,” called someone. “You’ll 
be going to bed soon. Say, Larry, do that one with 
the three tennis balls.” 

“Isn’t room enough. I know a good trick with 
coins, though. Any fellow got two halves ? ’ ’ 

Groans of derision were heard and at that mo¬ 
ment someone discovered the presence of Don and 
Tim and Larry’s audience deserted him. When 
the new-comers had found accommodations, such 
as they were, conversation switched to the all- 
absorbing subject of football. Most of the fellows 
assembled were members of the first or second 
teams: Larry Jones was a substitute half; Clint 
Thayer was first-choice left tackle; Steve Ed¬ 
wards, sprawled on Clint’s bed, was left end and 
this year’s captain; the short, sturdy youth in the 
Morris chair was Thursby, the centre; Tom Hall, 
broad of shoulders, was right guard; Harry Wal¬ 
ton, slimmer and rangier, with a rather saturnine 


28 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


countenance, was a substitute for that position. 
Jim Morton was, as we know, manager, and only 
Amory—or “ Amy”—Byrd and Leroy Draper, the 
tow-headed, tip-nosed youth sharing the Morris 
chair with Thursby, were, in a manner of speaking, 
non-combatants. 

But being a non-combatant didn’t prevent Amy 
Byrd from airing his views and opinions on the 
subject of football, and that he was now doing. 
“Every year,” he protested, “I have to hear the 
same line of talk from you chaps. It’s wearying, 
woesomely wearying. Now, as a matter of fact, 
every one of you knows that we’ve got the average 
material and that we’ll go ahead and turn out an 
average team and beat Claflin as per usual. The 
only chance for argument is what the score will be. 
You fellows like to grouse and pretend every fall 
that the team’s shot full of holes and that the 
world is a dark, dreary, dismal place and that win¬ 
ning from Claflin is only a hectic dream. For the 
love of lemons, fellows, chuck the undertaker stuff 
and cheer up. Talk about something interesting, 
or, if you must talk your everlasting football, cut 
out the sobs!” 

“Oh, dry up, Amy,” said Tom Hall. “You 
oughtn’t to be allowed to talk. Someone stuff a 
pillow in his mouth. No one has said we were shot 


AMY HOLDS FORTH 


29 


full of holes, but you can’t get around the fact that 
we’ve lost a lot of good players and-” 

4 ‘ Oh, gee, he’s at it again! ’ ’ wailed Amy. 6 i Yes, 
Thomas darling, you’ve lost two fellows out of the 
line and two out of the backfield and there’s noth¬ 
ing to live for and we’d better poison ourselves oft 
before defeat and disgrace come upon us. All is 
lost save honour! Ah, woe is me!” 

“Cut it out, Amy,” begged Edwards. “You 
don’t know anything about football, you idiot.” 

“Two in the line and two in the backfield is 
good,” jeered Tim. “We’ve lost Blaisdell and 
Innes and Tyler-” 

“Never was any good,” interpolated Amy. 

“And Roberts and Marvin-” 

“Carmine’s better!” 

“And Kendall and Harris!” concluded Tim tri¬ 
umphantly. 

“Never mind, Timmy, you’ve still got me!” re¬ 
plied Amy sweetly. “Gee, to hear you rave you’d 
think the whole team had graduated!” 

“ So it has, practically! ’ ’ 

“Ah, yes, and I heard the same dope this time 
last year. We’d lost Miller and Sawyer and Wil¬ 
liams and—and Milton and a dozen or two more 
and there wasn’t any hope for us! And all we 
did was to go ahead and dodder along and beat 


30 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


Claflin seven to nothing! Not so bad for a life¬ 
less corpse, what?” 

Steve Edwards laughed. ‘ ‘ Well, maybe we do 
talk trouble a good deal about this time of year. 
It’s natural, I guess. You lose fellows who played 
fine ball last year and you can’t see just at first 
how anyone can fill their places. Someone always 
does, though. That’s the bully part of it. I dare 
say we’ll manage to dodder along, as Amy calls 
it, and rub it into old Claflin as we’ve been doing.” 

“First sensible word I’ve heard tonight,” said 
Amy approvingly. “I wouldn’t kick so much if I 
only had to hear this sort of stuff occasionally, but 
I’m rooming with the original crepe-hanger! 
Clint sobs himself to sleep at night thinking how 
terribly the dear old team’s shot to pieces. If I 
remark in my optimistic, gladsome way, ‘Clint, 
list how sweetly the birdies sing, and observe, I 
prithee, the sunlight gilding yon mountain peak,’ 
Clint turns his mournful countenance on me and 
chokes out something about a weak backfield! 
Say, I’m gladder every day of my life that I 
stayed sane and-” 

“Stayed what?” exclaimed Jim Morton incred¬ 
ulously. 

“And didn’t become obsessed with football 
mania!” 


AMY HOLDS FORTH 


31 


“Where do you get the words, Amy?” sighed 
Clint Thayer admiringly. 

“Amy’s the original phonograph,” commented 
Tim. “Only he’s an improvement on anything 
Edison ever invented. You don’t have to wind 
Amy up!” 

“No, he’s got a self-starting attachment,” 
chuckled Draper. 

“Returning to the—the original contention,” 
continued Amy in superb disdain of the low jests, 
“I’ll bet any one of you or the whole kit and 
caboodle of you that we beat Claflin again this 
year. Now make a noise like some money!” 

“Amy, we don’t bet,” remarked Tom Hall. 
‘ 1 At least, not with money. Betting money is very 
wrong. (Amy sniffed sarcastically.) But I’ll 
wager a good feed for the crowd that we have a 
harder time beating Claflin this year than we had 
last. And I’ll-” 

“Oh, piffle! I don’t care whether you have to 
work harder to do it or not. I say you’ll do it! 
Hard work wouldn’t hurt you, anyway. You’re a 
lot of loafers. All any of you do is go out to the 
field and strike an attitude like a hero. Why-” 

Cries of expostulation and threats of physical 
violence failed to disturb the irrepressible 
Amy. 


32 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


‘ 4 Tell you what I’ll do, you piffling Greeks, I’ll 
blow you all off to a top-hole dinner at the Inn if 
Claflin beats us. There’s a sporting proposition 
for you, you undertakers’ assistants!” 

“Yah! What do we do if she doesn’t?” ex¬ 
claimed Walton. 

Amy surveyed him coldly. He didn’t like 
Harry Walton and never attempted to disguise 
the fact. “Why, Harry, old dear, you’ll just keep 
right on squandering your money as usual, I sup¬ 
pose. But I don’t want you to waste any on me. 
This is a one-man wager. ’ ’ 

“No, it isn’t,” said Leroy Draper, “I’m in on 
it, Amy. I’ll take half of it.” 

“All right, Roy. But our money’s safe as safe! 
This bunch of grousers won’t get fat off us, old 
chap! ’ ’ 

“Say,” said Walton, who had been trying to get 
Amy’s attention for a minute, “what’s the story 
about my squandering my money? Anybody seen 
you being careless with yours, Amy?” 

“Not that I know of. I’m not careless with it; 
I’m careful. But being careful with money is dif¬ 
ferent from having it glued to your skin so you 
have to have a surgical operation before-” 

“Oh, cut it, Amy,” said Tim. 

“I spend my money just as freely as you do,” 


AMY HOLDS FORTH 33 

returned Walton hotly. “You talk so much with 
your face-” 

“Let it go at that, Harry,’’ advised Tom Hall 
soothingly. “Amy’s just talking.” 

6 6 That’s all,’ ’ agreed Amy sweetly. c 6 Just talk¬ 
ing. You’re the original little spendthrift, Harry. 
I’m going to write home to your folks some time 
and warn ’em. Hold on, you chaps, don’t hurry 
off. The night is still in its infancy. Wait and 
watch it grow up. Steve! Sit downl” 

“Thanks, I’ve got to he moseying along,” re¬ 
plied Captain Edwards. “It’s pretty near ten. I 
think it would be a rather good idea if we had a 
rule that football men were to be in their rooms 
at a quarter to ten all during the season.” 

“I can see that you’re going to be one of these 
here martinets you read about,” said Tim with 
a sigh. “Steve, remember you were young once 
yourself.” 

“He never was!” declared Amy with decision. 
“Steve was grown-up when he was quite young 
and he’s never got over it. Thank the Fates I 
don’t have to be bossed by him! Are you all leav¬ 
ing? Clint, count the spoons and forks! Come 
again, everyone. I’ve got lots more to say. Good¬ 
night, Don. Glad to see you back again, old sober¬ 
sides. Sorry about that fin of yours. Be careful 



34 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


with him, Tim. You know how it is with the dear 
old team. We need every man we can get. Hold 
on, Harry! Did you drop that quarter? Oh, I 
beg pardon, it’s only a button. That’s right, 
Thurs, kick the chair over if it’s in your way. 
We don’t care a bit about our furniture. For the 
love of lemons, Larry, don’t grin like that! Think 
of the team, man! Remember your sorrows! 
Good -night!” 

Half-way to Billings Don broke the silence. 

“Fellows are funny, aren’t they?” he mur¬ 
mured. 

4 ‘Funny? How do you mean?” asked Tim. 

“Oh, I don’t know,” replied Don after a 
thoughtful moment. 4 ‘ They ’re—they’re so differ¬ 
ent, I guess.” 

‘ 4 Who’s different from who?” 

“Everyone,” answered Don, smothering a 
yawn. 

Tim viewed him in the radiance of the light 
over the doorway with profound admiration. 
“Don, you’re a brilliant chap! Honest, some¬ 
times I wonder how you do it! Doesn’t it hurt?” 

Don only smiled. 


CHAPTER IV 


THE FIRST GAME 

Don sat on the bench and watched the game 
with Thacher School. With him were nearly a 
|dozen other substitutes, but they, unlike Don, 
were in football togs and might, in fact probably 
would, get into the game sooner or later. There 
was no such luck for Don so long as his hand re¬ 
mained swathed in bandages, and he was silently 
bewailing his luck. At his right sat Danny Moore, 
chin in hand and elbow in palm, viewing the con¬ 
test from half-closed eyes. The trainer was small 
and red of hair and very freckled, and he was 
thoroughly Irish and, in the manner of his race, 
mightily proud of it. Also, he was a clever little 
man and a good trainer. 

An attempted forward pass by the visitors 
grounded and the horn squawked the end of the 
first period. Danny turned his beady green eyes 
on Don. 6 6 Likely you ’re wishin 7 yourself out there 
with the rest of ’em, boy,” he said questioningly. 

Don nodded, smiled his slow smile and shook 
his head. “I guess I won’t get into it for a week 
• 35 


36 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


yet. Doe says this hand has got to do a lot of 
healing first. He has a fine time every day pulling 
and cutting the old skin off it. Guess he enjoys 
it so much he will hate to have it heal. I should 
think, Danny, that if I had a heavy glove, sort of 
padded in the palm, I might play a little.’ ’ 

“Sure, I’ll fix you up something real nate,” 
replied Danny readily. “Nate an’ scientific, d’ye 
see? An’ so soon as the Doc says the word 
you come to me an’ I’ll be having it ready for 
you. ’ ’ 

“Will you? Thanks, Danny. That’s great! I 
would like to get back to practice again. I’m 
afraid I’ll be as stiff and stale as anything if I 
stay out much longer.” 

“Go easy on your eating, lad, and it’ll take you 
no time at all to catch up with the rest of ’em. 
Spread this hand for me while I see the shape of 
it. What happened to your finger there?” 

“I broke it when I was a little kid, playing 
baseball.” 

“Sure, whoever set it for you must have been 
cross-eyed,” said the trainer, drily. “ ’Tis a bum 
job he did.” 

“Yes, it’s a little crooked, but it works all 
right.” 

“You’d have hard work gettin’ your engagement 


THE FIRST GAME 37 

ring over that lump, I'm thinking. It's a fortu¬ 
nate thing you're not a girl, d'ye mind." 

Don laughed. “Engagement rings go on the 
other hand, don't they, Danny?" 

“Faith, I don't know. Bad luck to him, he's 
done it again!'' 

“Who? What?" asked Don startledly. 

“Jim Morton. That's twice today he's spilled 
most of the water from the pail. Well, I'll have 
to go an' fill it, I suppose." 

Danny went off to get the water bucket and the 
teams lined up again near the visitors' twenty-five 
yard line. Coach Robey had put in a somewhat 
patched-up team today. Captain Edwards was 
at left end, Clint Thayer at left tackle, Gafferty at 
left guard, Peters at centre, Pryme at right guard, 
Crewe at right tackle, Lee at right end, Carmine 
at quarter, St. Clair and Gordon at half and Mar¬ 
tin at full. It was not the best line-up possible, 
but it was so far handling the situation fairly sat¬ 
isfactorily. The practice of the last two days had 
developed one or two strains and proved more 
than one of the first-choice fellows far below con¬ 
dition. Tim Otis was out for a day or two with 
a twisted knee and Tom Hall with a lame shoul¬ 
der. Thursby had developed an erratic streak the 
day before and was nursing his chagrin further 


38 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


along the bench. Holt, the best right end, was in 
trouble with the faculty, and Rollins, full-back, had 
pulled a tendon in his ankle. A full team of sec¬ 
ond- and third-string players were having signal 
work on the practice gridiron. 

In the stands a fairly good-sized gathering of 
onlookers was applauding listlessly at such infre¬ 
quent times as the maroon-and-grey team gave it 
any excuse. Thus far, however, exciting episodes 
had been scarce. The weather, which was ener- 
vatingly warm, affected both elevens and the play¬ 
ing was sluggish and far from brilliant. The 
Brimfield backs, with the exception of Carmine, 
who was always on edge, conducted themselves as 
if they were at a rehearsal, accepting the ball in 
an indifferent manner and half-heartedly plung¬ 
ing at the opposing line or jogging around the 
ends. As the first half drew to a close both goal 
lines were still unthreatened and from all indica¬ 
tions would remain so for the rest of the contest. 
A slight thrill was developed, though, just before 
the second period came to an end when a Thacher 
half-back managed to get away outside Crewe and 
romped half the length of the field before he was 
laid low by Carmine. After that there was an ex¬ 
change of punts and the teams trotted oft to the 
gymnasium. 


THE FIRST GAME 


39 


Don left the bench with the others, but did not 
follow them to the dressing room. Instead, he 
strolled down the running track and across to the 
practice field, where Tim was superintending the 
signal practice. Don joined him and followed the 
panting, perspiring players down the field. Tim’s 
conversation was rather difficult to follow, since he 
continually interrupted himself to instruct or ad¬ 
monish the toilers. 

“I feel like a slave-driver, pushing these poor 
chaps around in this heat. How’s the game going? 
No score? We must be playing pretty punk, I 
guess. What sort of a team has—Jones, you 
missed your starting signal again. For the love 
of mud, keep your ears open!—Thacher must be 
as bad as we are. Who’s playing in my place? 
Gordon? Is he doing anything?—Try them on 
that again, McPhee, will you? Robbins, you’re 
supposed to block hard on that and not let your 
man through until the runner’s got into the line.— 
I could have played today all right, but that idiot, 
Danny, wouldn’t let me. My knee’s perfectly all 
right.” 

“Then why do you limp?” asked Don inno¬ 
cently. 

“Force of habit,” said Tim. “What time is 
it?” 


40 LEFT GUARD GILBERT 

Don consulted his silver watch and announced 
a quarter to four. 

* ‘Thank goodness! That’ll do, fellows. You’d 
better get your showers before you try to see that 
game. If Danny catches you over there the way 
you are he will just about scalp you! By the way, 
McPhee, you saw what I meant about that end- 
around play, didn’t you? You can’t atford to 
slow up the play by waiting for your end to get 
to you. He’s got to be in position to take the 
pass at the right second. Otherwise they’ll come 
through on you and stop him behind the line. 
There ought to be absolutely no pause between 
Smith’s pass to you and your pass to Compton, 
or whoever the end is. You get the ball, turn 
quick, toss it to the end and fall in behind him. 
It ought to be almost one motion. Of course, I 
know you fellows were pretty well fagged today, 
but you don’t want to let your ends think they can 
take their time on that play, old man, for it’s got 
to be fast or it’s no earthly good. Thus endeth 
the lesson. Come on, Don, and we’ll go over and 
add the dignity of our presence to that little 
affair.” 

They reached the bench just as the two teams 
trotted back and Brimfield’s supporters raised a 
faint cheer. Don imagined that there was a little 


THE FIRST GAME 


41 


more vim in the way the maroon-and-grey war¬ 
riors went into the field for the second half and 
the results proved him right. 

It was the home team’s kick-off, and after Cap¬ 
tain Edwards, in the absence of Hall, had sped the 
ball down to Thacher’s twenty yards and a 
Thacher player had sped it back to the thirty, 
Brimfield settled down to business. Probably Coach 
Robey’s remarks in the interim had been suffi¬ 
ciently caustic to get under the skin. At all events 
Brimfield forced Thacher to punt on third down 
and then almost blocked the kick. As it was, the 
ball hurtled out of bounds near the middle of the 
field and became Brimfield’s on her forty-eight. 
Two plunges netted five yards, and then St. Clair, 
returning to form, ripped his way past tackle on 
the left and fought over two white lines before 
he was halted. Gordon and Martin made it first 
down in three tries and Carmine worked the left 
end for four more. Thacher stiffened then, how¬ 
ever, and after two ineffectual plunges St. Clair 
punted and Brimfield caught on her goal line and 
ran back a dozen yards, Lee, right end, missing 
his tackle badly and Steve Edwards being neatly 
blocked off. But Thacher found the going even 
harder than her opponent had and in a moment 
she, too, was forced to punt. 


42 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


This time it was St. Clair who caught and who, 
eluding both Thacher ends, ran straight along the 
side line until he was upset near the enemy’s 
thirty-five yards. As he went down he managed 
to get one foot over the line and the referee 
paced in fifteen yards, set the ball to earth and 
waved toward the Thacher goal. 

Martin faked a forward pass and the ball went 
to Gordon for a try at right tackle. Thayer and 
Gafferty opened a fine hole there and Gordon 
romped through and made eight before the 
Thacher secondary defence brought him down. 
Martin completed the distance through centre. 
From the twenty-four yards to the ten the ball 
went, progress, however, becoming slower as the 
attack neared the goal. On a shift that brought 
Thayer to the right side of the line, St. Clair got 
around the short end for three and Martin added 
two more, leaving the pigskin on the five-yard line. 
It was third down and Martin went back to kick. 
But after a moment’s hesitation Carmine changed 
his signals and the ends stole out toward the side 
lines. Thacher proceeded to arrange her forces 
to intercept a forward pass and again Carmine 
switched. The ends crept back and Martin re¬ 
tired to the fifteen-yard line and patted the turf. 
Carmine knelt in front of him and eyed the goal. 


THE FIRST GAME 


43 


Then the signals came again, and with them the 
ball, and it was Martin who caught it and not Car¬ 
mine. Two steps to the right, a quick heave, a 
frenzied shouting from the defenders of the goal, 
a confused jostling, and Captain Edwards, one 
foot over the line, reached his arms into the air, 
pulled down the hurtling pigskin, tore away from 
one of the enemy, lunged forward and went down 
under a mass of bodies, but well over the goal line. 

Brimfield found her enthusiasm then, and her 
voice, and cheered loudly and long, only ceasing 
when Carmine walked out with the ball under his 
arm and flung himself to the turf opposite the 
right hand goal post. Thursby, hustled in by Coach 
Robey, measured distance and direction, stepped 
forward and, as the line of Thacher warriors 
swept forward with upstretched hands, swung 
his toe against the ball and sent it neatly across 
the bar. 

With the score seven to nothing against her, 
Thacher returned to the fray with a fine determi¬ 
nation, but, when the teams had changed places 
after the kick-off and the last period had begun, she 
speedily found that victory was not to be her por¬ 
tion. Mr. Robey sent in nearly a new team during 
that last ten minutes and the substitutes, fresh 
and eager, went at it hammer-and-tongs. Thacher 


44 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


enlisted fresh material, too, but it couldn’t stop 
the onslaught that soon took the ball down the 
field to within close scoring distance of her goal. 
That Brimfield did not add another touchdown was 
only because her line, overanxious, was twice 
found off-side and penalised. Even then the ball 
went at last to within six inches of the goal line 
and it was only after the nimble referee had dug 
into the pile-up like a terrier scratching for a bone 
in an ash-heap that the fact was determined that 
Thacher had saved her bacon by the width of the 
ball. She kicked out of danger from behind her 
goal and after two plays the final whistle blew. 

It was a very hot and very weary crowd of fel¬ 
lows who thronged the dressing room in the gym¬ 
nasium five minutes later and, above the swish of 
water in the showers, shouted back and forth and 
discussed the game from as many angles as there 
had been participants. Possibly Brimfield had 
no very good reason for feeling proud of her 
afternoon’s work, for last year she had defeated 
Thacher 26 to 3. That game, however, had taken 
place two weeks later in the season, when the 
Maroon-and-Grey was better off in the matter of 
experience, and so perhaps was not a fair com¬ 
parison. At all events, Brimfield liked the way 
she had ‘‘come back” in that third period and 


THE FIRST GAME 


45 


liked the way in which the substitutes had be¬ 
haved, and displayed a very evident inclination to 
pat herself on the back. 

Tim, who had haled Don into the gymnasium 
on the way back to hall, tried his best to convince 
all those who would listen to him that they had 
played a perfectly punk game and that nothing 
but the veriest fluke had accounted for that score. 
But they called him a “sore-head” and laughed 
at him, and even drove him away with flicking 
towels, and he finally gave it up and consented to 
accompany Don back to Billings, limping a trifle 
whenever he thought no one was looking. 

Don missed Tim at supper, for the training 
tables started that evening and Tim went otf to 
one of them with his napkin ring and his own par¬ 
ticular bottle of tomato catsup, leaving his chum 
feeling forlornly “out of it.” 


CHAPTER V 


DON GOES TO THE SECOND 

Life at Brimfield Academy settled down for Don 
into the accustomed routine. The loss of one day 
made no difference in the matter of lessons, for 
with Tim’s assistance—they were both in the Fifth 
Form—he easily made up what had been missed. 
They were taking up German that year for the 
first time and Don found it hard going, but he man¬ 
aged to satisfy Mr. Daley after a fashion. Don 
was a fellow who studied hard because he had to. 
Tim could skim his lessons, make a good showing- 
in class and remember enough of what he had gone 
over to appear quite erudite. Don had to get right 
down and grapple with things. He once said en¬ 
viously, and with as near an approach to an 
epigram as he was capable of, that whereas Tim 
got his lessons by inhaling them, he, Don, had to 
chew them up and swallow them! But when ex¬ 
amination time came Don’s method of assimila¬ 
tion showed better results. 

The injured hand healed with incredible slow- 

46 


DON GOES TO THE SECOND 


47 


ness, but heal it did, and at last the day came when 
the doctor consented to let his impatient pupil put 
on the padded arrangement that the ingenious 
Danny Moore had fashioned of a discarded 
fielder’s glove and some curled hair, and Don tri¬ 
umphantly reported for practice. His triumph 
was, however, short-lived, for Coach Robey viewed 
him dubiously and relegated him to the second 
squad, from which Mr. Boutelle was then form¬ 
ing his second team. “ Boots” was a graduate 
who turned up every Fall and took charge of the 
second or scrub team. It was an open secret that 
he received no remuneration. Patriotism and 
sheer love of the game were the inducements that 
caused Mr. Boutelle to donate some two months 
of time and labour to the cause of turning out a 
second team strong enough to give the first the 
practice it needed. And he always succeeded. 
1 4 Boutelle’s Babies,” as someone had facetiously 
termed them, could invariably be depended on to 
give the school eleven as hard a tussle as it wanted 
—and sometimes a deal harder. Boots was a bit 
of a driver and believed in strenuous work, but his 
charges liked him immensely and performed mira¬ 
cles of labour at his command. His greeting of 
Don was almost as dubious as had been Coach 
Robey’s. 


48 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“Of course I’m glad to have you, Gilbert, but 
the trouble is that as soon as we’ve got you nicely 
working Mr. Robey will take you away. That’s a 
great trick of his. He seems to think the purpose 
of the second team is to train players for the first. 
It isn’t, though. He gives me what he doesn’t 
want every year and I do my best to make a team 
from it, and I ought to be allowed to keep what I 
make. Well, never mind. You do the best you can 
while you’re with us, Gilbert.” 

“Maybe he won’t have me this year,” 
said Don dejectedly. “He seems to think that 
being out for a couple of weeks has queered 
me.” 

“Well, you don’t feel that way about it, do 
you?” 

“No, sir, I’m perfectly all right. I’ve watched 
practice every afternoon and I’ve been doing a 
quarter to a half on the track.” 

“Hm. Well, you’ve got a little flesh that will 
have to come off, but it won’t take long to lose it 
this weather. Sit down a minute.” They were 
in front of the stand and Mr. Boutelle seated him¬ 
self on the lower tier and Don followed his ex¬ 
ample. “Let me see, Gilbert. Last year you 
played left guard, didn’t you?” 

“Yes, sir.” 


DON GOES TO THE SECOND 


49 


“And if I remember aright your chief difficulty 
was in the matter of weights ’ 

“I’m twelve pounds heavier this fall, sir.” 

“Yes, but some of that’ll come off, I guess. 
However, that doesn’t matter. You were get¬ 
ting along pretty well at the last of the sea¬ 
son, I remember. Who’s ahead of you on the 
first?” 

“Well, Gafferty’s got the first choice, I guess. 
And then there’s Harry Walton.” 

“You can beat Walton,” said Boots decisively. 
‘ ‘ W alt on lacks head. He can’t think things out for 
himself. You can. What you’ll have to do this 
year, my boy, is speed up a little. It took you 
until about the middle of the season to find your 
pace. Remember ? ’ ’ 

“Yes, sir, I know.” 

“Well, you won’t stay with us long, as I’ve said, 
and so I’m not going to build you into the line, 
Gilbert. I’ve got some good-looking guard mate¬ 
rial and I can’t afford to work over you and get 
dependent on you and then have Robey snatch you 
away about the middle of the fall. That won’t do. 
But I’ll tell you what we will do, Gilbert. We’ll 
use you enough to bring you around in form 
slowly. You’ll play left guard for awhile every 
day. But what I want you to really do is to help 


50 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


with the others. You’ve been at it two years now 
and you know how the position ought to be played 
and you’ve got hard common-sense. I’ll put the 
guard candidates in your hands. See what you 
can do with them. There’s a couple of likely chaps 
in Kirkwell and Merton, and there are two or three 
more after positions. You take them in charge, 
Gilbert, and show me what you know about coach¬ 
ing. What do you say?” 

“Why, Mr. Boutelle, I—I don’t know that I can 
show anyone else what to do. I can play the posi¬ 
tion myself after a fashion, but—well, I guess it’s 
another thing to teach, isn’t it!” 

“Oh, I don’t know. It is if you go into it with 
the idea that it is, but don’t do that. Play the 
position as it ought to be played, tell the others 
why, call them down when they make mistakes, 
pat them on the back when they do right. Just 
forget that you’re trying to teach. If a fellow 
came to you and said: ‘Gilbert, I want to play 
guard but I don’t know how, and I wish you’d tell 
me how you do it,’ why, you wouldn’t have any 
trouble, would you?” 

“N-no, sir, I guess not,” replied Don a trifle 
doubtfully. 

“Well, there you are. Try it, anyway. You’ll 
get on all right. I’ll be right on hand to dig the 


DON GOES TO THE SECOND 


51 


spurs in when your courage fails. ” Mr. Boutelle 
smiled. “We’re going to have a dandy second 
team this fall, my boy. We’ve got nothing to 
build on, only a lot of green material, and that’s 
the best part of it. I don’t care how inexperienced 
the material is if it’s willing to learn and has the 
usual number of arms and legs and such things 
and a few ounces of grey matter in the cranium. 
Well, here we go. Nothing today but passing 
and punting, I guess. Sure your hand’s all 
right?” 

“Yes, sir, thanks. I don’t really need this con¬ 
trivance; it’s awfully clumsy; but Doc said I’d 
better wear it for a few days.” 

“Best to be on the safe side. I’ll have you take 
one squad of these chaps, I guess, and I’ll give the 
other to Lewis. You know the usual stuff, Gil¬ 
bert. Rest ’em up now and then; they’re soft and 
the weather’s warm. But work ’em when they’re 
working. Any fellow who soldiers gets bounced. 
All out, second squad!” 

There wasn’t anything that afternoon but the 
sort of drudgery that tries the enthusiasm of the 
tyro: passing the ball in circles, falling on it, 
catching it on the bound and starting. Don was 
surprised to discover how soft he was in spite of 
his daily exercise on the cinders. When the hour’s 


52 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


practice was over he was just about as thankful 
as any of the puffing, perspiring youths around 
him. Considering it afterward, Don was unable 
to view the material with the enthusiasm Mr. Bou- 
telle had displayed. To him the thirty-odd boys 
who had reported for the second team were a hope¬ 
less lot, barring, of course, a few, not more than 
four in all, who had had experience last season. 
In another week Mr. Robey would make a cut in 
the first squad and the second would find itself 
augmented by some ten or twelve cast-offs. But 
just now the second squad looked to Don to be a 
most unlikely lot. When he confided all this to 
Tim that evening the latter said: 

“Don’t you worry, old man. Boots will make a 
team out of them. Why, he could make a football 
team out of eleven clothing store dummies! Some¬ 
times I think that Boots ought to be head coach 
instead of Robey. I’ve got nothing against Robey, 
either. He’s a bit of a ‘miracle man’ himself, but 
for building a team out of nothing Boutelle has 
him both shoulders to the mat!” 

“I don’t believe Boots would want to coach the 
first,” replied Don. 

“Why not?” 

“I don’t know. He’s sort of—well, he kind of 
likes to—Oh, I don’t know.” 


DON GOES TO THE SECOND 


53 


‘ 4 Very clearly explained, Donald.’’ 

44 Well, Boots, if he was a soldier, would be the 
sort that would want to lead a charge where the 
odds were against him. See what I mean?” 

“You mean he has a hankering for the forlorn 
chance business? Maybe so. That’s not a bad 
name for the second, is it ? The Forlorn Chances! 
I guess you’ve got him dead to rights, though. 
Boots is for the under dog every time. I guess 
coaching the first and having his pick of the play¬ 
ers wouldn’t make any sort of a hit with Boots. It 
would be too tame. Boots likes to take three dis¬ 
carded veterans, two crips and a handful of green 
youngsters and whittle them into a bunch that will 
make us sweat and toil to score on. And, what’s 
more, he does it! Bet you anything, Don, this 
year’s second will be every bit as good as last 
year’s.” 

“I won’t take it, because I think so myself,” 
laughed Don. “I can’t see how he’s going to do 
it, Tim, but something tells me he will!” 

“Oh, with you to coach the guards it will be no 
trick at all,” said Tim, grinning. 

Don smiled thinly. “I’ll make an awful mess 
of it, I guess,” he muttered. 

“Not you, boy!” and Tim slapped him encour¬ 
agingly on the back. “You’ll blunder right ahead 


54 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


to glory, same as yon always do. You’ll make 
hard work of it and all that, but you’ll get there. 
Don, you’re exactly like the porpoise—no, the tor¬ 
toise in the fable. You don’t look fast, old man, 
but you keep on moving ahead and saying nothing 
and when the hares arrive you’re curled up on the 
finish line fast asleep. Tortoises can’t curl up, 
though, can they? And, say, what the dickens is 
a tortoise, anyway? I always get tortoises and 
porpoises mixed.” 

44 A porpoise is a fish,” replied Don gravely. 
44 And a tortoise is a land turtle. But they’re both 
anthropoids.” 

“Are they?” asked Tim vaguely. “All right. 
Here, what are you grinning at? Anthropoids 
nothing! An anthropoid is a monkey or—or some¬ 
thing.” 

“You’re an anthropoid yourself, Timmy.” 

44 Meaning I’ma monkey ?’’ 

“Not at all. Here, look it up.” And Don 
shoved a dictionary across the table. Tim ac¬ 
cepted it suspiciously. 

44 All right,” he said, 44 but if it’s what I think 
it is you’ll have to fight. Anthesis, anthropocos- 

mic- Say, I’m glad you didn’t call me that! 

Here it is. Now let’s see. ‘Anthropoid, somewhat 
like a human being in form or other character'is- 



DON GOES TO THE SECOND 


55 


tics’ I Something like- You wait till I get you 

in the tank again! ‘Something like a human 
being’! For two cents I’d lay you on the bed and 
spank you with that tennis racket I ” 

“I’ve got two cents that say you can’t do it,” 
replied Don. 

'“Well, I could if there wasn’t so much of you,” 
grumbled Tim. “Now shut up and let me stuff 
awhile. Horace has been eyeing me in a way I 
don’t like lately. How’s your German going?” 

“Not very well. It’s a silly language, I think. 
But I guess I’ll get the hang of it after awhile. 
What I want to know is why they can’t make their 
letters the way we do.” 

“Because they’re afraid someone might be able 
to read the plaguy stuff. Tell you what we’ll do, 
Don.” 

“What’ll we do?” 

“We’ll go for a swim in the tank after study. 
Will you?” 

Don winked slowly. “Not after that threat, 
thanks.” 

“I won’t touch you, honest to goodness, Don! 
Did you learn to swim any better this Summer?” 

“Where would I learn?” asked the other. 
“There’s no place to swim out my way,unless it’s 
the river.” 



56 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“Well, don’t the rivers in Kansas contain 
water ? 9 ’ 

“Yes, sometimes! Winter, usually. If you’ll 
promise not to grab me when I’m not looking I’ll 
go. I hate the taste of that tank water, Tim. ’ ’ 

“You ought to know how to swim, old man. 
Never mind, Mr. Conklin will get hold of you this 
Winter and beat it into you.” 

“I can swim now,” replied Don indignantly. 

“Oh, yes, you can swim like a hunk of lead! 
The last time I saw you try it you did five strokes 
and then got so elated that you nearly drowned 
yourself trying to cheer! I could teach you in 
three lessons if you’d let me.” 

“Much obliged, but nothing doing, Timmy. I’d 
as lief drown by myself as have you hold my head 
under water.” 

“That was just a joke, Don. I won’t ever do it 
again. I wanted you to get used to the water, you 
see.” 

“I don’t mind getting used to it outside, but I 
hate to fill up with it, Tim. It tastes very nasty. 
You may be a good teacher, but I don’t like your 
methods.” 

“Well, we’ll go and have a dip, anyway,” 
laughed Tim. “It’ll set us up and refresh us 
after our arduous stuffing.” 



DON GOES TO THE SECOND 


57 


“If you don’t cut out the chatter there won’t he 
any stuffing,” warned Don. “It’s almost half¬ 
past now. And I’ve got three solid pages of this 
rot to do. Dry up, like a good pal.” 


CHAPTER VI 


THE SEARCH OF AH VENTURE 

By that time Brimfield had played her second 
game and lost it, 6 to 14, to Canterbury High 
School. Canterbury was not considered very 
formidable and Brimfield usually had little trouble 
with her. But this year things had gone wrong 
from the start of the game to the finish, wrong, 
that is, from Brimfield’s point of view. Fumbling 
had been much in evidence and poor judgment 
even more. Carmine had worked like a Trojan at 
quarter-back for two periods, but had somehow 
failed to display his usually good generalship, 
and McPhee, who had taken his place at the be¬ 
ginning of the second half, while he ran the team 
well, twice dropped punts in the backfield, one of 
which accounted for Canterbury’s second touch¬ 
down and goal. Oddly enough, it was the veterans 
who failed most signally to live up to expectations, 
and of all the veterans Tom Hall was the worst 
offender. Possibly Tom’s shoulder still bothered 
him, but even that couldn’t have accounted for all 
his shortcomings. Crewe, who played tackle be- 
58 


THE SEARCH OF ADVENTURE 59 


side Tom, was not a very steady man, and Tom’s 
errors threw him off his game badly, with the 
result that, until Coach Robey put Pryme in for 
Tom in the third period, Canterbury made a 
lamentable number of gains at the right of the 
Brimfield line. Even Tim Otis, usually undis¬ 
turbed by anything short of an earthquake, was 
affected by the playing of the others and finally 
had what he called a “brain-storm’’ in the third 
period, getting the signals twisted and being 
thrown back for an eight-yard loss. That misad¬ 
venture bothered him so that he was heartily glad 
when Gordon was rushed in a few minutes later. 

The team took the beating to heart and the 
school at large was disposed to indulge in sarcasm 
and bitterness. Only Coach Robey seemed undis¬ 
turbed. He lavished no praise, you may be sure, 
but, on the other hand, neither did he utter any 
criticism after the contest was over. Instead, he 
laid off more than half the line-up on Monday and 
Tuesday, and, since the weather continued almost 
unseasonably warm, the rest was just what the 
fellows needed. Wednesday’s practice went with 
a new snap and vim and those who broiled in the 
afternoon sun and watched it found grounds for 
hope. 

It was on Wednesday that Don began his con- 


60 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


nection with the second team, and by then the in¬ 
jured hand was so well along that he was able to 
discard the glove. Three days of kindergarten 
work followed, with, on Saturday, a short signal 
drill. The first team journeyed away that after¬ 
noon to play Miter Hill School, and Don would 
have liked very much to have gone along. But 
Boots put his charges through a good, hard hour 
and a half of work, and Don had all he could 
attend to at home. Just before supper he did, 
however, walk down to the station and meet Tim 
when the team arrived home. Tim, who seemed 
remarkably fresh for a youth who had played 
through the most of four ten-minute periods, 
scorned the coach and he and Don footed it back. 

“Twenty to nothing, my boy,” said Tim ex¬ 
ultantly. ‘ ‘ They never had a look-in. It was 
some game, believe me, dearie! And I want to 
tell you, too, that Miter Hill is fifty per cent, better 
than Canterbury ever thought of being! ’ 9 

6 6 That’s fine , 9 9 said Don. “ What sort of a game 
did you play?” 

“Me? Oh, I was the life of the party. Got off 
two nice little runs, one for thirty and the other 
for forty-five yards. Got a touchdown the second 
time. I wouldn’t have, though, if Steve hadn’t 
paced me most the way down and put the quarter 


THE SEARCH OF ADVENTURE 61 


out. Old Steve played like a whirlwind today. 
We all did, I guess. There was only one fumble, 
and that wasn’t anyone’s fault. Holt got a for¬ 
ward pass and a Miter Hill chap plunged into him 
and just about knocked the breath out of him and 
hesTet go of the ball.” 

“Twenty to nothing? Three touchdowns, 
then.” 

“Yep, and Rollins only missed one goal. Rol¬ 
lins scored once, I scored once and Steve took over 
the last one.” 

“Forward pass?” 

“No, end-around. It went off great, too. We 
were way back on the eighteen yards, I think it 
was, and we worked the fake forward pass play, 
with Steve taking the ball from Carmine. We 
fooled them finely. They never got onto it at all 
until Steve was over the line. Some of the fel¬ 
lows who were doing so much grousing last week 
ought to have come along today and seen some 
real football. Robey was as pleased as anything. 
You could tell that because he looked sort of cross 
and told us how bad we were!” 

“Wish I’d seen it,” mourned Don. 

“It was some game, all right, all right! We’re 
going to have a modest celebration this evening; 
just Tom Hall and Clint Thayer and Hap Crewe, 


62 LEFT GUARD GILBERT 

maybe, and yonrs truly. Better come along. Will 
you?” 

‘ ‘ Where are you going ? ’ ’ 

“Oh, just down to the village. We’ll leave the 
window open.” 

“You’ll get nabbed if you try that,” demurred 
Don. “Better not, Tim.” 

“Well, we may be back by ten. No harm in 
having a way open in case something delays us, 
though. We’ll have a little feed at the Inn, you 
know, and-” 

“Don’t be a chump,” growled Don. “You’re 
in training and you know mighty well Robey won’t 
stand for any funny-business.” 

“What Robey doesn’t know isn’t going to hurt 
him,” replied Tim untroubledly. “And he won’t 
know anything about this because he’s off for 
home on the seven o’clock train. Tom heard him 
tell Steve he wouldn’t be back until Monday 
noon.” 

“Yes, but someone will see you and Robey’ll 
hear of it. And then you’ll get the dickens from 
him and be hauled up to the office. Better not 
risk it, Timmy.” 

“Gee, you’re worse than Mr. Poe’s crow! Or 
was it a raven? What’s the difference, anyhow? 
Now don’t tell me they’re both anthropeds or 


THE SEARCH OF ADVENTURE 63 


pods, or whatever it is, because I’m onto you as 
a disseminator of knowledge! I never got even 
with you yet for calling me ‘something like a 
human being’.” 

“I’ll take it back, then; you aren’t. But, just 
the same, Tim, I wish you’d cut out the celebra¬ 
tion.” 

“You’re all the time interfering with my inno¬ 
cent pleasures/’ protested Tim. “Why, bless 
you, dearie, we aren’t going to cut-up. We’re 
merely going to stroll quietly to the village, troll¬ 
ing a song, mayhap, and look in the windows.” 

“That’ll take you a long time,” Don laughed. 
‘ ‘ There are only half a dozen. ’ ’ 

“Wrong. A fellow opened a watchmaker’s 
emporium next door to the post office t’other day 
and has a most fascinating window. It has four 
alarm clocks, three pairs of cuff-links and a 
chronometer in it! Oh, it’s swell! Do you realise, 
Don, that slowly but surely our little village is 
taking on the—the semblance of a metropolis! 
All we want is a movie palace!” 

“Let’s start one. They say there’s a lot of 
money in them.” 

“Bet there is! We’ve got three or four at 
home, and they’re peaches. Full every minute, 
too. I went a lot last Summer; had filmitis, I 


64 LEFT GUARD GILBERT 

guess. But how about the party? Will you come 
along ?” 

44 No, thanks.’’ 

“Oh, come on, Don! Have a heart! Be one of 
our merry gang.” 

“I’d rather not, thank you. I like Josh well 
enough, but I don’t like to stand on the carpet 
and hear him say ‘Until further notice, Gilbert.’ 
Nothing doing, Tim!” 

And Don remained adamant the rest of the way 
to school and while they made a hurried toilet and 
rushed to dining hall in an effort to reach it be¬ 
fore the food gave out. 

The team members received an ovation that 
evening when they entered the dining hall. It 
seemed as if the school wanted to make up for its 
unkindness of a week before. Some few of the 
fellows, recalling sarcastic comments overheard, 
were inclined to be haughty and unforgiving, but 
eventually they melted. Don, now at the second 
training-table, presided over by Mr. Boutelle, saw 
that Coach Robey’s chair was vacant, which fact 
bore out Tim’s statement that the coach had gone 
home over Sunday. But, even granting that, Don 
didn’t approve of Tim’s celebration, for, as he 
very well knew, after a football victory fellows 
were very likely to be carried away by their en- 


THE SEARCH OF ADVENTURE 65 


thusiasm and to forget such trifling things as 
rules and regulations. He determined to try 
again to dissuade Tim after supper. 

But Tim, who was in a very cheerful and expan¬ 
sive mood, refused to be dissuaded. Instead, he 
turned the tables and begged so hard for Don to 
come with him that Don finally relented. After 
all, there was no harm in the excursion if they got 
permission and were back in hall by ten o’clock. 
And it was a wonderfully pleasant, warm evening, 
much too fine an evening to spend indoors, and— 
well, secretly, Don wanted some fun as much as 
any of them, perhaps! 

Permission was easily obtained and at seven 
they met Tom Hall and Clint Thayer in front of 
Torrence. Crewe failed them, but Tim said it 
didn’t matter; that there were only four “Three 
Muskateers” anyhow! So they set off for the 
village in high spirits, through a warm, fragrant, 
star-lighted evening, with no settled plan of action 
in mind save to do about as they liked for the suc¬ 
ceeding three hours. Clint Thayer had a strip of 
plaster across the saddle of his nose, which gave 
him a strangely benign expression. Tom walked 
a bit stiffly and confessed to “a peach of a shin,” 
which probably meant something quite different 
from what it suggested. Only Tim, of the three 


66 


LEFT GUAED GILBERT 


first team fellows, had emerged unscathed, and he 
referred to the fact in an unpleasantly superior 
manner which brought from Tom Hall the remark 
that it was easy enough to get through a game 
without any knocks if you didn’t do anything! 
"Whereupon Tim flicked him across the cheek with 
an imaginary glove, the challenge was issued and 
accepted and the two fought an exciting duel with 
rapiers—as imaginary as the glove—on the side¬ 
walk, feinting, thrusting, parrying, until Clint 
cried “The guard! The guard!” and they all 
raced down the road to the nearest lamp-post, 
where Tim insisted on looking to his wounds. To 
hear him tell it, he was as full of holes as a sieve, 
while, on the same authority, Tom was a dead man. 
Tom denied being dead, but Tim insisted and re¬ 
fused to pay any heed to him all the rest of the way 
to the village on the ground that, being dead, Tom 
had no business to talk. 

But when they reached what Tim called “the 
heart of the city” Tom was allowed to come to life 
again. The heart of the city consisted of the 
junction of two village streets whereon were 
located the diminutive town hall, the post office, 
a fire house and five stores. They began with the 
druggist’s, ranging themselves in front of one of 
the two windows and pretending to be over- 


THE SEARCH OF ADVENTURE 67 

whelmed with the beauty and magnificence of the 
goods displayed. 

M What beautiful soap, 1 ’ exclaimed Tom. “I 
never saw such beautiful soap, fellows. Pink and 
green and white I Looks almost good enough to 
wash with, doesn’t it?” 

“And get on to the lovely toilet set in the green 
velvet box,” begged Tim awedly. “Scissors and 
brushes and little do-funnies and-•” 

“I’m going to buy a bottle of that hair-grower,” 
announced Don. “I want to raise a beard.” 

“Let’s get a bottle and present it to Uncle Sim,'” 
suggested Clint. Uncle Sim was Mr. Simkins, the 
Greek and Latin instructor, and was noticeably 
bald. The others chuckled and thought very well 
of the suggestion until Tom discovered that the 
price, as stated on the label, was one whole dollar. 
They had, they decided, better uses for what little 
money they carried. Eventually they went inside, 
and sat on stools in front of the small soda foun¬ 
tain and drank gaily-coloured concoctions which, 
according to Tim, later, sounded better than they 
tasted. Having exhausted the amusement to be 
derived from the drug store, they went to the fire 
house next door and, pressing their noses against 
the glass, debated what would happen if an alarm 
was rung in. There was a box beside the doors, a 


68 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


most tempting red box, and Tim eyed it longingly 
until Don led him gently but firmly away from 
temptation. 

In the small store across the street they exam¬ 
ined all the books and magazines displayed on the 
counters, which didn’t take long, as literature was 
not a large part of the stock, and Tim spent ten 
cents for a football guide, explaining that he had 
always wanted to know some of the rules of that 
game! Don bought some candy and Clint a bag of 
peanuts, although the others protested that if they 
ate truck they’d spoil their appetites for real food. 
The force of the protest was somewhat marred by 
the actions of the protestants, who helped them¬ 
selves liberally to the contents of the two bags. 

There was a convenient fence a few steps along 
the street and they perched themselves on the top 
rail and consumed the peanuts and candy and 
watched the “rush of the great city,” to again 
quote the poetic Tim. During the next twenty 
minutes exactly eight carriages and four automo¬ 
biles entered their range of vision; and at that 
Clint insisted that they had counted one automo¬ 
bile twice. He accused it of going around the block 
in order to add to the confusion. Possibly some 
three dozen persons passed within sight, although 
that may have been a too liberal estimate. Tom at 


THE SEARCH OF ADVENTURE 69 


last declared that he couldn’t stand the excitement 
any longer; that his brain reeled and his eyes 
ached; and that he was going to find a quiet spot 
far from the dizzy whirl. So they adjourned to the 
grocery and butcher shop and talked learnedly of 
loins and shoulders and ribs. And Clint dragged 
what he alluded to as a “brisket” into the conver¬ 
sation to the confusion of the others, who had 
never heard of it and didn’t believe in it anyway. 
Tom said Clint meant “biscuit” and that this 
wasn’t a bakery. Then he caught sight of some 
rather pathetic and unseasonable radishes and, 
having a passion for radishes, went in and pur¬ 
chased four bunches. That outlay led to an ex¬ 
penditure for salt, and as a large, round paste¬ 
board carton of it was the least they could buy, 
they retreated down the street to the Inn porch, 
trickled the salt along the top of the railing, drew 
up chairs and consumed the radishes at their 
leisure. All, that is, save Tim. Tim didn’t like 
radishes, called them “fire-crackers” and pre¬ 
tended to be deeply disgusted with his companions 
for eating them. 

When the radishes were consumed they invaded 
the Inn and assaulted the water tank in force. 
Then, as there were practically no sights left to be 
viewed, they went back to their chairs and, as Tom 


70 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


had it, waited for inspiration. Don was for trol- 
leying over to the shore, having a dip in the ocean 
and returning to school in good time. But Tim 
pointed out that the trolley line was a good half- 
mile distant, that he had not filled himself with 
radishes and was consequently quite famished for 
food and favoured remaining within easy distance 
of the Inn so that, in case he grew faint, he could 
reach sustenance. Don’s motion was defeated. In 
view of what eventually occurred, that was, per¬ 
haps, unfortunate. 


CHAPTER VII 


FIGHTING FIRE 

“This,” said Tim presently, “is a bit dull, if you 
ask me. I came out for some excitement. Let’s 
do something.” 

“What?” asked Clint, yawning loudly. 

“Let’s eat.” 

The others groaned. 

“That’s all right for you chaps, but I’m getting 
hungry,” Tim asserted. “I thought we were 
going to have a feed. They’ll be closing this place 
up the first thing we know. How about a rarebit, 
fellows?” 

“Oh, let’s wait awhile,” said Hon. “Let’s take 
a walk and get up an appetite. ’ ’ 

“Walk!” jeered Tim. “Gee, I’ve walked 
enough. And there’s nothing the matter with my 

appetite right now. Tell you what-” Tim 

paused. An automobile was stopping in front of 
the Inn. The headlights suddenly dimmed and the 
single occupant, a tall man in a light overcoat, got 
out, walked up the path, ascended the steps and 
passed into the house. “Now, who’s he?” asked 
71 


72 LEFT GUARD GILBERT 

Tim. “Say, I wish he’d loan us his car for 
awhile. ’ ’ 

“Run in and ask him,” suggested Tom. “He 
looked kind.” 

“Maybe he’d give us a ride if we asked him,” 
pursued Tim. “It’s a peach of a car; foreign, I 
guess.” 

“It’s a Mercy Dear,” said Tom. 

“Or a Fierce Sorrow,” hazarded Clint. 

“Bet you it’s a Cheerless,” said Don, “or a 
Backhard.” 

“Don’t care what it is,” persisted Tim. “I 
want a ride in it.” 

“Let’s go down and stand around it with our 
fingers in our mouths,” said Tom, with a chuckle. 
“Perhaps he will take pity on us and ask us in.” 

“Or we might open the door for him,” offered 
Don. 

At that moment Clint, who had left his chair to 
lean across the railing and gaze past the end of 
the porch, interrupted with an exclamation. 1 ‘ Say, 
fellows, what’s that light over there?” he asked 
eagerly. 

“ Fire, by jingo!” cried Tim. 

“That’s what!” agreed Tom. “Say, you don’t 
suppose it’s the school, do you?” 

“Of course not! The school’s over that way. 


FIGHTING FIRE 73 

Besides, that fire’s away off; maybe two miles. 
Come on I” And Clint started for the steps. 

“ Waitl” called Tim. “I want to see the engine 
come out. Bet you it’s a fine sight! Anyway, we 
can’t foot it two miles.” 

4 ‘Maybe it isn’t that far,” said Don. “Fires 
look further than they are sometimes.” 

“Yes, and nearer, too,” replied Tim. “Think 
we ought to run over and tell them about it?” 

But that question was speedily answered by 
the sudden clanging of a gong inside the fire 
house, followed by the sound of running footsteps 
and, an instant later, the wild alarm of the shrill- 
tongued bell in the little belfry. 

“My word!” exclaimed Tom. “I didn’t know 
there were so many folks in the town!” Already 
a small-sized crowd had gathered in front of the 
fire house, some fifty yards up the street. The 
doors rolled open and a figure pushed through the 
throng and loped across the street and disap¬ 
peared. The bell clanged on and on. Don and 
Clint and Tom made a dash for the steps. Tim 
slid over the railing. But before any of them had 
more than reached the sidewalk the tall owner of 
the automobile catapulted himself down the steps, 
hailing them as he came. 

“Where is it, boys?” he shouted. 


74 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“Over there,” answered Clint, pointing. But 
the glow in the sky was scarcely visible from the 
sidewalk and they all swarmed back to the porch 
again* 

“I see,” said the man. “Some farm house, I 
guess. They’ll know at the fire house.” He 
sprang down the steps again, the boys streaming 
after him. He was already in the car when Tim 
asked breathlessly s “You going, sir I” 

“Sure! Want to come? Pile in, then. There 
are some packages in there. Look out for 
them.” 

Clint had already put his foot down hard on 
something that, whatever it might be, was never 
meant to be walked on, but he made no mention of 
the fact. The car leaped forward, swung to the 
right, stopped with a jerk six inches from a lamp- 
post, backed, straightened out and careened along 
to the fire house. All was excitement there. Men 
were rushing into the building and rushing out 
again, agitatedly donning rubber coats and hats. 
Speculation was rife. A score of voices argued as 
to the location of the fire. The throng swayed 
back and forth. The man in the car demanded in¬ 
formation as he drew up at the curb and a dozen 
answers were flung at him. Then a small, fat man 
ran up and leaned excitedly across the front of the 


FIGHTING FIRE 75 

auto. i 1 Hello, Mr. Brady 1” he panted. “You 
going out there ?” 

“Yes, but I've got a load, Johnson. Where 
is it?” 

“Don’t no one seem to know. Jim Cogswell 
knows, but he’s gone for the horses.” 

1 ‘ Look out! Here they come! ’’ “ Get that auto 
out of the way there! ” “ Stand aside, everyone !’ 1 
“Get a move on, Jim!” A lean little man in his 
shirt sleeves suddenly appeared leading two jog¬ 
ging horses, while a third horse trotted along be¬ 
hind. The crowd scampered aside and the horses 
beat a tattoo on the floor as they wheeled to their 
places. Mr. Brady jumped from his seat, pushed 
his way through the crowd as it closed in again 
about the doorway and disappeared. Tim 
whooped with delight. 

“What did I tell you?” he demanded. “Didn’t 
I say it would be a great sight? Gee, I haven’t 
had such a good time since I had the measles!” 

Mr. Brady reappeared, scrambled back to his 
seat and slammed the door behind him. 1 ‘ Jim says 
it’s Corrigan’s barn, ’ ’ he said. ‘‘ Sit tight, boys! ’ ’ 
The car leaped forward once more, took the first 
corner at twenty miles an hour, took the next at 
thirty and then, in the middle of a firm, hard road, 
simply roared away into the starlit darkness, the 


76 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


headlights throwing a great white radiance ahead. 
Tim, on the front seat, whipped off his cap and 
stuffed it into his pocket. Behind, the three boys 
huddled themselves low in the wide seat while the 
wind tore past them. 

“Must be going ninety miles an hour!” gasped 
Clint. 

“Suppose we bust something!” said Tom 
awedly. 

Don braced his feet against the foot-rail. “Let 
it bust!” he answered exultantly. 

That was a memorable ride. Tim owned after¬ 
ward that he thought he had ridden fast once or 
twice before, but that he was mistaken. “I 
watched that speedometer from the time we turned 
the second corner,” he declared, “and it never 
showed less than fifty-three and was generally 
around sixty! If I hadn’t been so excited I’d been 
scared to death!” 

Now and then one of the boys behind looked 
back along the road, but if anyone was following 
them the fact wasn’t apparent. Almost before 
they were conscious of having travelled any dis¬ 
tance the car topped a slight hill at a dizzy speed 
and the conflagration was in sight. A quarter of 
a mile distant a big barn was burning merrily. 
The car slowed down at the foot of the descent, 


FIGHTING FIRE 


77 


swung into a lane and pitched and careened toward 
the burning structure. Other buildings were clus¬ 
tered about the barn and a good-sized white dwell¬ 
ing house stood in dangerous proximity. Between 
house and barn, standing out black against the 
orange glow of the fire, was a group of women and 
children, while a few men, not more than a half- 
dozen it seemed, were wandering hither and 
thither in the radiance. A horse with trailing 
halter snorted and dashed to safety as the automo¬ 
bile turned from the lane and came to a stop under 
an apple tree. 

“Far as we go!” shouted Mr. Brady. “Come 
on, boys, and lend a hand! ’’ 

The lights dimmed, the engine stopped and the 
occupants of the car scrambled out and ran up 
the lane. “They can’t save that barn,” panted 
Mr. Brady, “but they’d ought to save the rest of 
them. ’ ’ 

A man attired principally in a pair of overalls 
and a flannel shirt and carrying an empty bucket 
advanced to meet them. 

“Is the engine coming?” he asked listlessly. 

“They hadn’t started when I left,” answered 
Mr. Brady, “and I guess you needn’t look for them 
for fifteen or twenty minutes. Got any water 
handy when it does come?” 


78 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“I’ve got a tank full up there, and there’s a 
pond behind the house. But I don’t know’s they 
can do anything. Looks to me like everything’s 
bound to go. Well, I got insurance.” 

“Got plenty of buckets?” asked Mr. Brady, 
peeling off his coat. * ‘ How many men are here ? ’ ’ 
“About six or seven, I guess. Yes, there’s buck¬ 
ets enough, but the heat’s so fierce-•” 

“Animals all out?” 

“There’s some pigs down there. W^e tried to 
chase ’em out, but the plaguy things wouldn’t go. 
We got the horses and cows out and a couple o’ 
wagons. All my hay’s done for, though. And 

there’s a heap o’ machinery in there-” 

“Well, we can save the other buildings, can’t 
we?” asked Mr. Brady impatiently. “Get your 
buckets and your men together, Corrigan. Here 
are five of us, and we can make a line and keep the 
roofs wet down until the engine comes, I guess. 
Send the women for all the pails and things you’ve 
got. Get a hustle on, man!” 

Mr. Corrigan hesitated a moment and then trot¬ 
ted away. The water supply was contained in a 
wooden tank set some ten feet above ground, and 
high beyond that, dimly discernible through the 
cloud of smoke, the spectral arms of a wind-mill 
revolved imperturbably. Mr. Brady, followed by 




FIGHTING FIRE 


79 


the boys, went on around to the further side of the 
burning building. It was a huge hip-roofed struc¬ 
ture. One end, that nearest the house, was already 
falling, and the tons of crackling hay in the mows 
glowed like a furnace. The heat, even at the foot 
of the wind-mill, a hundred feet or more away, was 
almost intolerable. A row of one-story buildings 
ran along one side of the barn, so near that the 
flying sparks blew over rather than on to them. 
Several other detached structures stood at greater 
distances. Mr. Brady, surveying the scene, shook 
his head doubtfully. 

“Guess he’s right,” he said. “There’s not 
much use trying to save those nearer buildings. 
We couldn’t stay on those roofs a minute. I guess 
the chief danger will be from sparks lighting on 
the house and that creamery there. Things are 
mighty dry.” 

Four or five men dangling empty buckets, one of 
them Mr. Corrigan’s son and the others neigh¬ 
bours, came up and asked about the fire depart¬ 
ment and Mr. Brady repeated what he had told 
the older man. “What we’ve got to do,” he con¬ 
tinued, “is to keep the roof on the house and the 
dairy wet. Those sparks are flying all over them. 
What’s that small building over there?” 

“That’s the ice-house, Mr. Brady.” 


80 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“Well, we won’t bother about that. How many 
are there of us?” 

“Six, I guess,” said one of the men, but another 
corrected him. 

“Old Man Meredith and Tom Young just drove 
in,” he announced. “That makes eight of us, and 
there’s five of you-” 

“Well, come on, then,” Mr. Brady interrupted 
briskly. “You fellows get your pails full and look 
after the dairy. Get on the roof, a couple of you, 
and keep it wet down. The rest can lug water. 
Got a ladder handy? All right. Somebody fetch 
it in a hurry. Hold on! Isn’t there water in the 
dairy?” 

“Yes, sir, plenty of it.” 

i i Then fill your buckets inside and hand them up 
to the men on the roof. I’ll take my gang and go 
over to the house.” 

The following half-hour was a busy time for the 
four boys. Mr. Brady and Don stood precariously 
athwart the ridge of the house roof while Tim and 
Clint and Tom, later assisted by others, filled buck¬ 
ets in the kitchen, raced up two flights of stairs 
and a short ladder—often losing half of their bur¬ 
den on the way—and passed them through a sky¬ 
light to those outside. A dozen times the dry 
shingles caught fire under the rain of sparks, but 


FIGHTING FIRE 


81 


Mr. Brady, climbing along the ridge like a cat, 
tossing buckets of water with unerring precision, 
kept the fire at bay. It was warm work for all. 
On the roof the heat of the fire was unpleasantly 
apparent, while in the house it was stiflingly close 
and the work of carrying the pails up and down 
stairs soon had the three boys in a fine perspira¬ 
tion and badly off for breath! 

When the engines arrived, heralded by loud ac¬ 
claim from the onlookers, who had by then multi¬ 
plied remarkably, the barn was merely a huge 
pyre of glowing hay and burning timbers, only one 
far corner remaining erect. The piggery and ad¬ 
joining buildings were ablaze in several places. 
The creamery roof had caught once or twice, but 
each time the flames had been subdued. If the 
engine and hose-cart and two carriages bearing 
members of the volunteer fire department had been 
slow in arriving, at least the fire-fighters got to 
work expeditiously and with surprisingly little 
confusion. Don, pausing for a moment in his 
labour of passing buckets to look down, decided 
that Brimfield had no cause to be ashamed of its 
department. In a jiffy the hose-cart was rattling 
across the yard—and, incidentally, some flower 
beds—in the direction of the pond behind the house, 
and a moment or two later the engine was pump- 


82 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


ing vigorously and a fine stream of water was wet¬ 
ting down the roofs of the threatened structures. 
Axes bit into charring timbers, sparks flew, enthu¬ 
siastic, rubber-clad firemen dashed here and there, 
shouting loudly, the audience cheered and the 
worst was over 1 

With the collapse of the remaining section of 
barn wall the danger from sparks was past, and, 
emptying one final bucket, Mr. Brady, followed by 
a very wet, very tired and very warm Don, crept 
back through the skylight and joined the others 
below. Mr. Brady rescued his coat, led the way 
to the kitchen pump and drank long and copiously, 
setting an example enthusiastically emulated by 
the boys. Tim declared that if he drank as much 
as he wanted there wouldn’t be enough water left 
to put out the fire with! 

“Well, boys,” said Mr. Brady, finally setting 
down the dipper and drawing a long breath, “I 
guess we did pretty well for amateurs, 'eh. ? I don’t 
know whether we get any thanks, for I’ve a sus¬ 
picion that Corrigan would have been just as 
pleased if everything had gone. From the way he 
talked when we got here I guess he wanted the 
insurance more’n he did the buildings!” Mr. 
Brady chuckled. “Well, we put one over on him 
in that case, eh*? Want to stick around much 


FIGHTING FIRE 83 

longer! I guess most of the fun’s over; unless 
they’re going to serve some of that roast pig!” 

* ‘ They got the pigs out,’ 7 chuckled Tim, 4 ‘ They 
were running around here awhile ago like crazy. 
About twenty of them, big and little, squealing 
and getting between people 7 a feet. Those pigs had 
the time of their lives!” 

“Well, then, suppose we start along home!” 
said Mr. Brady. “You fellows ready!” 

They agreed that they were. The remains of the 
barn were already blackening, and, while the fire¬ 
men, evidently determined to make the most of the 
occasion, were still swinging axes and pouring 
water on the already extinguished and well-soaked 
buildings, there was no danger of further trouble. 
Mr. Corrigan, surrounded by a group of sympa¬ 
thetic neighbours, was cataloguing his losses and 
Mr. Brady called to him as they passed. 

“Good-night, Corriganl Sorry for you, but 
you’ve saved your house anyway I” 

“Yes, sir, Mr. Brady. I’m greatly obliged to 
you, sir, and them young fellers, too. It’s a bit of 
a loss, sir, but there’s pretty good insurance.” 

“That’s fortunate. Good-night!” Mr, Brady 
chuckled as they went on into the darkness of the 
orchard. “Bet you he’s downright peeved with 
us, boys, for wetting that roof down! I happen 


84 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


to know that he’s been losing money on this place 
for five years and been trying to sell it for a 
twelvemonth.” 

“You don’t suppose,” began Tom, “that he— 
er—that he-” 

“Set the fire? Well, I’d rather not suppose 
about that. As there’s no evidence against him 
we’d better give him the benefit of the doubt, I 
guess.” 



CHAPTER VIII 


COACHING THE TACKLES 

The ride back was far less exciting. Mr. Brady 
drove the big car leisurely and conversed with 
Clint, who had succeeded to the seat of honour in 
front. Mr. Brady, it appeared, had a poultry 
farm some distance on the other side of Brimfield. 
He seemed a trifle surprised and pained when he 
discovered that Clint had never heard of the Cedar 
Ridge Poultry Farm, and at once issued an invita¬ 
tion to visit it. 

“You come over some time and Ifll show you 
some stock that fll open your eyes. Bring your 
friends along. Tell the conductor on the trolley 
where you want to go and he fll set you down right 
at my gate. You can't miss it, though, anyhow, 
for I've got nearly a quarter of a mile of houses 
there. Silver Campines are my specialty. Raise 
a few White Wyandottes, too. You wouldn't 
think to look at me that the doctors came mighty 
near giving me up ten or eleven years ago, eh? 
Did, though. That was just after I finished col¬ 
lege. They said the only thing would save me was 
85 


86 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


hiking out to Colorado or Arizona or New Mexico. 
Some said one place and some said another. See¬ 
ing that they couldn’t decide, I settled the ques¬ 
tion myself. Came out here, bought ten acres of 
land—I’ve got nearly forty now—and lived in a 
tent one Summer while my house was building. 
Doctors said it wouldn’t do, but I fooled them. 
Slept out of doors every night, worked like a slave 
fourteen hours a day and put on flesh right from 
the start. I’m not what you’d call fat now, I guess, 
but you ought to have seen me then! An old chap 
I had putting up my first chicken house told me he 
could work me in nicely for a roosting pole! Went 
back to one of the doctors three years ago and had 
him look me over. He had to admit that I was a 
pretty healthy specimen. You could see that he 
was downright peeved about it, though!” Mr. 
Brady chuckled. “Then I settled the matter to 
my own satisfaction by taking out some life insur¬ 
ance. When I got my policy I stopped worrying 
about my health. You drop over some afternoon 
and let me show you how to live like a white man 
and make a little money, too. There’s no life like 
it, and I wouldn’t go back to the city if they gave 
me the Ritz-Carlton to live in!” 

Clint responded that he and the others would 
like very much to visit Cedar Ridge some day, but 


COACHING THE TACKLES 


87 


that just now they were all pretty busy in the 
afternoons with football. That struck a responsive 
chord and Mr. Brady harked back to his school 
and college days when he, too, had fondled the pig¬ 
skin. “I wasn’t much of a player, though,” he 
acknowledged. “I was sort of tall and puny-look- 
ing and not very strong. Still, I did get into my 
school team in my senior year and played on my 
freshman team in college. The next year I had 
to give it up, though. I’d like to come over some 
day and see you fellows play. I’ve always been 
intending to. I haven’t seen a real smashing foot¬ 
ball game for years. That’s funny, too, for I can 
remember the time when I used to think that if I 
could get on my ’varsity eleven I’d die happy.” 
He laughed as he swept the searchlights around a 
corner. “A man’s ambitions change, don’t they? 
Now what I want to do is to raise the champion 
egg producer. I’m going to do it, too, before 
long. ’ ’ 

And Clint quite believed it. Any man, he told 
himself, who could take command of a situation 
as Mr. Brady had that evening, and who could 
make enough money in the poultry business to own 
a three-thousand dollar automobile was capable 
of anything! 

When they approached the town Mr. Brady 


88 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


swung off to the left, explaining that he would take 
the boys up to the school. There was a moment 
of silence and then Clint protested weakly. 
44 Shucks/’ was the reply, “it won’t take five min¬ 
utes longer, and after the way you fellows have 
worked tonight you don’t deserve to have to walk 
home! ’ ’ 

“Well, then—then I guess you’d better let us 
out at the corner, ’ ’ said Tim. 4 4 We’d hate to wake 
up the masters, Mr. Brady.” 

4 4 Oh, that’s it, eh V ’ Mr. Brady laughed loudly. 
44 Stayed out too late, have you?” 

4 4 I’m afraid we have, sir,” said Clint. 4 4 We’re 
supposed to be in hall before ten and it’s long 
after that now. If you’ll let us out at the corner 
of the grounds we can sort of sneak around back 
and maybe get in without being seen. Faculty’s 
beastly strict about outstaying leave. ’ ’ 

The car crossed the railroad track and presently 
pulled up quietly in the gloom of the trees along 
the road and the four boys noiselessly descended, 
shook hands, promised to pay a visit some day to 
Cedar Ridge and stole off to the right through the 
darkness. A moment later the tiny red light of the 
automobile vanished from sight. Tim called a halt 
at the wall. 44 You’d better bunk out with us to¬ 
night, Clint,” he whispered. 4 4 We’ll beat it 


COACHING THE TACKLES 


89 


around back of the gym and get in the shadows of 
the buildings. Say, Don, you’re sure we left that 
window unlatched ?” 

“Of course we did! It hasn’t been closed for a 
week.’ 9 

‘ ‘ Then forward, my brave comrades! If anyone 
sees us we’d better scatter and hide out for 
awhile.'” 

They climbed over a stone wall and made their 
way through a grove adjoining the school grounds, 
keeping close to the boundary fence. It was as 
dark as pitch in the woods and every now and then 
one or another would walk into a tree or fall over 
a root. Don’s teeth were chattering like castenets, 
for the night had grown cooler and a little breeze 
was blowing from the west, and his clothing 
was still far from dry. They crept past the 
back of the Cottage very cautiously, for there 
were lights upstairs and down, and breathed 
easier when the black bulk of the gymnasium 
loomed before them and they could crawl over the 
fence and drop back into school ground. From 
the corner of the gymnasium to Billings was a long 
distance, and looked just now longer than it ever 
had before. Also, in spite of the fact that there 
was no moon, the night was surprisingly light and 
Tim scowled disapprovingly at the stars as they 


90 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


paused for an instant at tlie corner of the building 
to get their breaths. 

“Keep low,” advised Tim, “and make for Tor¬ 
rence. Then we’ll stay close to the walls of the 
buildings. You want to see if there’s a window 
open in Torrence, Clint?” 

“No, I’ll stay with you fellows. I’d probably 
walk into a chair or a table and someone would 
take me for a burglar.” 

i 1 Come on, then. Haste to yon enfolding dark¬ 
ness!” 

They “hasted,” and a second or two after were 
creeping, doubled up lest their heads show above 
the darkened windows and arouse unwelcome curi¬ 
osity, along the rear of Torrence. Then they raced 
across the space dividing Torrence from Main 
Hall and repeated the proceedings until, finally, 
they were under the windows of Number 6 Bill¬ 
ings. Both were open at the bottom and their 
doubts and tribulations were at an end. Clint 
was assisted in first, Tom followed and then Tim 
and, finally, Don was unceremoniously yanked up 
and through. 

“Eureka!” breathed Tim. “Can you make it 
to your room, Tom? If you don’t want to risk it 
you can bunk out here on the window-seat or 
somewhere.” 



Finally, Don was unceremoniously yanked up and through 


















COACHING THE TACKLES 91 

“You may have half of my bed,” offered Don. 
But Tom was already removing his shoes. 

“If Horace hears me,” he whispered, “he’s got 
better ears than I think he has. Good-night, fel¬ 
lows. We had a bully time, even if we didn’t get 
that rarebit!” 

Tim groaned hollowly. “Therel Now you’ve 
gone and reminded me that I’m starved to 
death!” 

“Shut up,” warned Don. “Don’t forget that 
Horace’s bedroom is right there.” He nodded 
toward the wall. “Beat it, Tom, and don’t fall 
over your feet!” 

The door opened soundlessly, closed again and 
Tom was gone. They listened, and, although the 
transom was slightly open, not a creak or a shuffle 
reached them. “He’s all right,” whispered Tim. 
“Me for bed, fellows. Want to come in with 
me, Clint, or will you luxuriate on the window- 
seat?” 

“Window-seat, thanks. Got a coat or some¬ 
thing?” 

Tim pulled a comforter from the closet shelf 
and tossed it to him, and quietly and quickly they 
got out of their clothes and sought their couches. 
Ten minutes later three very healthy snores alone 
disturbed the silence of Number 6. 


92 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


The next morning Clint joined the others and 
walked unobtrusively along the Row with them in 
the direction of Wendell and breakfast, but when 
he reached Torrence he quite as unobtrusively 
slipped through the doorway and sought his room 
to repair his appearance and relieve the anxiety 
of Amory Byrd. And that seemed to conclude the 
adventure for all hands, and Don, for one, was 
extremely thankful that they had escaped detec¬ 
tion and the punishment which would have cer¬ 
tainly followed. But that Sunday afternoon, 
while on his way to Torrence to recover a book 
which Leroy Draper had borrowed in the Spring 
and neglected to return, he fell in with Harry 
Walton and made the disconcerting discovery that 
he had congratulated himself too soon. Don had 
no particular liking for Walton, although he by 
no means held him in the disdain that Amy Byrd 
and some others did, and he was a little surprised 
when Harry fell into step beside him. 

‘ 4 Have a good time last night V 7 asked Harry 
with an ingratiating leer. 

“Last night V 9 echoed Don vacantly. He re¬ 
membered then that Lawton roomed in Number 
20 Billings, directly above Number 6. “What 
about last night V 9 

Harry winked meaningly and chuckled. “Well, 


COACHING THE TACKLES 93 

I guess there was a party, wasn’t there ? I noticed 
you got home sort of late.” 

“Did I? What makes you think that?” 

“I happened to be looking out my window, Don. 
It was sort of hot and I wasn't sleepy. Who were 
the other fellows?” 

“Other fellows? I guess you didn't see any 
others, Walton.” 

Harry's saturnine countenance again wreathed 
itself with a growing grin. “Didn't, eh? All 
right. I probably imagined them.” 

“Maybe you were asleep and dreamed it,” said 
Don gravely. “Guess you must have, Walton.” 

“Oh, I'm not going to talk, Don. You needn't 
be afraid of that.” 

“I'm not,” responded the other drily. “Well, 
I'm going in here. So long, Walton.” 

“Bye, Don. I'm mum.” 

Don nodded and entered Torrence, but on the 
way upstairs he frowned disgustedly. He didn't 
believe for an instant that Walton would deliber¬ 
ately get them into trouble, but he might talk so 
much that the facts would eventually work around 
to one of the masters. Don wished that almost 
any fellow he knew save Walton had witnessed 
that entry by the window of Number 6. Later, 
when he returned from his visit to Roy Draper, 


94 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


without the book, by the way, since it had mysteri¬ 
ously disappeared, he recounted his conversation 
with Walton to Tim. Tim didn’t let it bother him 
any, however. 

“Harry won’t give us away. Why should he? 
Besides, if he did he would know mighty well that 
I’d spoil his brunette beauty!” 

“Well, he may tell it around and Horace or 
somebody’ll hear it. That’s all I’m worrying 
about. ’ ’ 

‘* Don’t worry, Donald. Keep a clear conscience 
and you’ll never know what worry is. That’s my 
philosophy. ’ ’ 

Don smiled and dismissed the matter from con¬ 
sideration. 

On Monday he had his first try at coaching the 
second team tackles and found that, after all,he got 
on fairly well. There were four candidates for 
the positions and two of them, Kirkwell and Mer¬ 
ton, promised well. Kirkwell, in fact, had already 
had a full season of experience on the second. 
Merton was a graduate from his last year’s hall 
team. The other two, Brace and Goodhugh, were 
novices and had everything to learn, and it was 
with them that Don laboured the hardest. Mon¬ 
day’s practice ended with a ten-minute scrim¬ 
mage between two hastily selected teams, and Don, 


COACHING THE TACKLES 


95 


for the first time that fall, played in his old posi¬ 
tion of left guard. Merton, who opposed him, 
found that he still had much to learn. 

On Tuesday, after a long and grilling tackling 
practice at the dummy, Coach Boutelle announced 
his line-up for the scrimmage against the first 
team, and Don was disappointed to find that Kirk- 
well and not he was down for left guard. The right 
guard position went to Merton. Don, with Mr. 
Boutelle and a half-dozen of the more promising 
substitutes, followed their team about the field, 
Boots criticising and driving and Don breaking 
in with hurried instructions to the guards. The 
first team had no trouble in piling up four touch¬ 
downs that afternoon, even though three regulars 
were still out of the line-up. Between the short 
periods Don coached Kirkwell and Merton again, 
and Kirkwell, who was a decent chap but fancied 
himself a bit, was inclined to resent it. 

‘ ‘ Chop it off, Gilbert / 1 he said finally. 41 Give a 
fellow a chance to use his own brains a little. Pm 
no greenhorn, you know. I played guard all last 
year on this team.” 

“I know you did,” answered Don. “And I 
don’t say you can’t play your position all right. 
But the best of us make mistakes, and Boots has 
told me to look out for them and try and correct 


96 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


them. I’da lot rather be playing than doing this, 
Kirkwell, but while I am doing it I ’m going to do 
it the best I know how. A fellow who isn’t in the 
game sees a lot the player doesn’t, and when-” 

“Oh, all right. Only don’t tell me stuff I know 
as well as I know my name, Gilbert. Don’t 
nag.” 

“Sorry. I’ll try not to. But you see what I 
mean about that stiff-arm business, don’t you? 
Don’t get out of position when you’re not sure 
where the play’s coming, Kirkwell. Stiff-arm 
your man and hold him off until you see what’s 
doing. Then you can play him right or left or 
shove him back. Once or twice you waited too 
long to find out where the play was coming and 
you didn’t hold your man off. Get me?” 

“Yes, but we don’t all play the position the 
same way, you know. What’s the good of spar¬ 
ring with your man when you’ve got to find where 
the play’s coming? You can’t watch the ball and 
your opponent too, can you?” 

“It doesn’t sound reasonable,” said Don, “but 
you can! You watch Hall do it, if you don’t be¬ 
lieve me. Maybe you don’t actually look two ways 
at once, Kirkwell, but you can watch your man and 
locate the play at the same time. I suppose it 
comes with practice,” 


COACHING THE TACKLES 97 

“I’d like to see yon do it,” replied Kirkwell 
aggrievedly. 

“ Watch Hall do it. He’s the best guard around 
here. I’m not setting up as an example.” 

“You talk like it,” muttered Kirkwell. But 
Merton, who had been a silent audience, stepped 
in to Don’s support. 

“Gilbert’s only trying to help us, Ned. Quit 
grousing. Come on; time’s up.” 

In spite of mutinous objections Kirkwell 
profited by Don’s advice and instruction and soon 
showed an improvement in his defensive playing. 
It didn’t appear that day, for Kirkwell was re¬ 
placed by Don before the second period was more 
than a few minutes old, while Merton gave way to 
Goodhugh. Don’s advent considerably strength¬ 
ened the left of the second team’s line and more 
than once during his brief presence there he had 
the satisfaction of outwitting Tom Hall and once 
got clear through and smeared a play well behind 
the first team’s line. 

Boots cut his squad from day to day and on 
Friday only some eighteen candidates remained. 
Brace went with the discard. Between parting 
with Brace and Goodhugh, Don, when consulted, 
chose to sacrifice the former. Possibly young 
Brace suspected Don’s part in his release, for, 


98 LEFT GUARD GILBERT 

for some time after that, he viewed Don with 
scowls. 

Don’s hand was now entirely healed, although 
the scars still showed, and, according to the doc¬ 
tor, would continue to show for a long time. Mr. 
Boutelle used Don at right guard during some 
portion of every scrimmage game against the 
first, a fact which caused Kirkwell a deal of 
anxiety. Kirkwell had from the first, and not un¬ 
reasonably, resented Don’s appearance with the 
second team squad. Don had been, as every fellow 
knew, slated for the first team, and Kirkwell 
thought it was unfair of him to drop back to the 
second and “try to do him out of his place.” 
Feeling as he did, it isn’t surprising that he took 
more and more unkindly to Don’s teaching. It 
took all of Don’s good nature at times to prevent 
an open break with Kirkwell. Once the latter ac¬ 
cused Don of trying to “ball him up” so that he 
would play poorly and Don would get the position. 
The next day, though, he made an awkward apol¬ 
ogy for that accusation and was quite receptive to 
Don’s criticisms and instructions. But Don’s task 
was no easy one and it grew harder as the season 
progressed and the second team, especially as to 
its linemen, failed to develop the ability Mr. 
Boutelle looked for. Don more than once was on 


COACHING THE TACKLES 


99 


the point of resigning his somewhat thankless 
task, but Tim refused to sanction it, and what Tim 
said had a good deal of influence with Don, 

‘ i Well, then,” he said moodily, “I hope Kirk- 
well will break something and get out of it.” 

“Tut, tut,” remonstrated Tim. “Them’s no 
Christian sentiments.’ ’ 

“I do, though. Or, anyway, I hope something 
will happen to let me out of it. Boots said he wras 
afraid Robey would take me on the first, but I 
don’t see any chance of it.” 

“I don’t see why he doesn’t, though,” mused 
Tim. “Your hand’s all right now and you’re 
playing a corking good game. You can work all 
around any guard he’s got except, maybe, Tom. 
Tom’s rather a bit above the average, if you ask 
me. Neither Walton nor Pryme amounts to a 
whole lot.” 

“Robey’s been playing Walton a good deal 
lately,” said Don. “I wouldn’t be surprised if he 
put him in ahead of Gafferty before long.” 

“There isn’t a lot to choose between them, I 
guess,” answered Tim. “Gafferty’s no earthly 
good on offence. Wait till we run up against Ben¬ 
ton tomorrow. Those huskies will show Gafferty 
up finely. And maybe some more of us,” Tim 
added with a chuckle. 


100 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“Oh, well-” began Don, vaguely, after a 

minute. 

But Tim interrupted. “Know what I think? I 
think Robey means to take you on the first later 
and is letting you stay with Boots just so you’ll 
get fined down and speeded up a bit. You know 
you’re still a little slow, Donald.” 

“I am?” Don asked in genuine surprise. “I 
didn’t know it. How do you mean, slow, 
Tim?” 

Tim leaned back in his chair and laced his 
fingers together behind his head. “Every way, 
Donald. I’m telling you this for your own good, 
dearie. I thought you realised it, though, or I’d 
have said it before. You start slow and you don’t 
get up steam until the play’s about over. If it 
wasn’t that you’re an indecently strong chap we’d 
get the jump on you every time. We do, as it is, 
only it doesn’t do us much good, because you’re a 
tough chap to move. Now you think it over, Don. 
See if you can’t ginger up a bit. Bet you any¬ 
thing that when you do Robey’ll have you yanked 
off that second team in no time at all! ” 

“I’m glad you told me,” said Don, after a mo¬ 
ment’s consideration. “I thought I was doing 
pretty well this fall. I know well enough it was 
being all-fired slow that kept me off the first last 


COACHING THE TACKLES 


101 


fall, but I surely thought I’d picked up a whole 
lot of speed. I’ll have to go back to practising 
starts, I guess.” 

“Oh, never mind the kindergarten stuff, old 
man. Just put more jump into it. You’ll find you 
can do it all right, now that you know about it. 
Why, I’ll bet you’ll be performing like a Jack 
rabbit before the season’s over!” 

“Like a jackass, more likely,” responded Don 
ruefully. 

“No, for a jackass, dearie, doesn’t take a hint.” 

“Well, but I don’t believe I can play any faster, 
Tim. If I could I’d be doing it, wouldn’t I? Just 
naturally, I mean. ’ ’ 

“Never mind the conundrums, Don. You try 
it. If you do I’ll be willing to guarantee you a 
place on the first. ’ ’ 

“I guess your guarantee wouldn’t cut much 
ice, ’ ’ objected Don, with a laugh. Then he sobered 
and added: “Funny game, though, me coaching 
Kirkwell and Merton and Goodhugh. Looks as if 
I was the one needed the coaching. ’ ’ 

“Sure. We all need it. No one’s perfect, Don, 
although, without boasting, I will say that I come 
pretty near it.” 

“You come pretty near being a perfect chump, 
if that’s what you mean.” 


102 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


Tim shook his head. “It isn’t at all what I 
mean. Now cut out the artless prattle and let me 
find some sense in this history stuff—if there is 
any!” 


CHAPTER IX 


THE WIDTH OP A FINGER 

At chapel the next morning Mr. Fernald, the prin¬ 
cipal, after the usual announcements had been 
made, lifted a newspaper from the table at his 
side and ran his eyes over an item there. “I have 
here,” he said, “a copy of this week’s Brimfield 
Times , which tells of an incident of which I 
had not learned. In telling of a fire on Sat¬ 
urday night last which destroyed a barn and 
damaged other buildings on the farm of Mr. Wil¬ 
liam Corrigan, some three miles from the village, 
the Times makes mention of the valuable assist¬ 
ance of a Mr. Grover Brady and four boys of this 
school. According to the Times, Mr. Brady and 
four boys dashed to the scene in a high-powered 
automobile, organised a bucket brigade and 
saved”—Mr. Fernald consulted his authority 
again—“ saved the dwelling house from the de¬ 
vouring element. The metaphor is that of the 
paper. Possibly the Times is misinformed with 
regard to the heroic young firemen, although I 
hope not. I should be very pleased to discover 
103 


104 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


that they were really Brimfieldians. If they were, 
if they are before me at this moment, I trust they 
will signify the fact by standing up. I'm sure we'd 
all like to know their identity and give them well- 
deserved applause. Now then, will the modest 
heroes kindly reveal themselves ?" 

Silence ensued, a silence broken only by a few 
whispers and some shuffling of feet. Every fel¬ 
low's eyes searched the room, or, at least, that is 
true of almost every fellow. Tim smiled inno¬ 
cently and expectantly at the principal, Clint 
studied the back of the head in front of him most 
interestedly, Don observed the scar in his hand 
absorbedly and Tom grinned because Steve Ed¬ 
wards was whispering from the side of his mouth: 
44 Why don't you get up, you bloomin' hero, why 
don't you get up?" Harry Walton was smiling 
that knowing smile of his and doing his best to 
catch Don’s eye. And Don somehow knew it and 
didn't dare look toward him. 

44 I'm disappointed," said Mr. Fernald after a 
minute. 4 4 Either the paper is mistaken or the 
fellows 'are over-modest. Well, if they won't 
speak for themselves perhaps someone else will 
volunteer to wrest them from the obscurity they 
so evidently court. How about that, boys? Any¬ 
one know who the heroes are ?'' 


THE WIDTH OF A FINGER 


105 


Again silence for an instant, and then, in various 
parts of the room, the sudden moving of seats or 
tramping of feet as though someone was about to 
get up. But no one did, and some of the younger 
boys in front began to titter nervously. Mr. Fer- 
nald smiled and laid the Brimfield Times back on 
the table. 

“No heroes amongst us, eh? Well, doubtless 
if any of you had been there you’d have performed 
quite as well as these unknown young gentlemen 
did. I like to think so. Dismissed.” 

“Do you think he suspects us?” asked Tom as 
he ranged himself beside Tim on the way out. 
“Gee, I thought once he was looking right at 
me!” 

“That’s what it is to have a guilty conscience,” 
replied Tim, in a virtuous tone. “Of course he 
doesn’t suspect. If he did he’d have named us, 
sure as shooting. The funny part of it is that he 
hasn’t thought about what time the fire was! 
Maybe the paper didn’t say. If he knew that he’d 
probably be a sight more anxious to find us!” 

“I was scared stiff that Harry Walton would 
blab. I didn’t dare look at him.” 

“Harry doesn’t know you were with us. He 
recognised Hon, or says he did, and he naturally 
thinks I was along, but he doesn’t know who the 


106 LEFT GUARD GILBERT 

other two were. If he opens his mouth I’ll brain 
him.’’ 

“I guess he won’t. He’s a sort of a pup, but 
he isn’t mean enough for that. Gee, but it almost 
ruined my appetite for breakfast!” 

‘‘Even if Josh did find out,” said Tim as they 
turned into Wendell, “he wouldn’t do much to us, 
I guess. It wasn’t our fault the fire was late in 
getting started, and the paper calls us 
heroes ” 

“I don’t believe it does. That’s some of Josh’s 
nonsense. I’m going to get a copy of the Times 
and see what it does say.” 

“Take my advice and let the Times alone,” ad¬ 
vised Tim. “Why, I wouldn’t be seen with a copy 
of it in my possession! It would be circumstan¬ 
tial evidence, or corroborative evidence or some¬ 
thing horrid, and I’d get pinched for sure. You 
keep away from the Times, dearie.” 

There was a good deal of interested speculation 
as to the identity of the four youths who had par¬ 
ticipated in the rescue of Farmer Corrigan’s 
dwelling, but the general opinion was to the effect 
-that the local paper had erred. One fellow made 
the suggestion in Don’s hearing that if faculty 
would look it up and see who had leave of absence 
Saturday night they might spot the chaps. Don 



THE WIDTH OF A FINGER 107 

sincerely hoped the idea wouldn’t occur to Mr. 
Fernald! 

But interest in the matter soon waned, for 
Brimfield was to play Benton Military Academy 
that afternoon and what sort of a showing she 
would make against that very worthy opponent 
was a far more absorbing subject for speculation. 
Benton had been defeated handily enough last 
year, but reports from the military academy this 
Fall led Brimfield to expect a hard contest. And 
her expectations were fulfilled. 

Benton brought at least a hundred neatly uni¬ 
formed rooters along and the field took on a very 
gallant appearance. The visitors seemed gaily 
confident of victory and from the time they 
marched into the field and took their places in the 
stand until the kick-otf there was no cessation of 
the songs and cheers from the blue-clad cohorts. 
Coach Robey started his best men in that game 
and, as was quickly proved, needed to. The first 
period was a bitterly contested punting duel in 
which Rollins, and, later, St. Clair came off second 
best. But the difference in the kicking of the rival 
teams was not sufficient to allow of much advan¬ 
tage, and the first ten-minute set-to ended without 
a score. In fact, neither team had been at any 
time within scoring distance of the other’s goal 


108 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


line. When play began again Benton changed 
her tactics and started a rushing game that for a 
few minutes made headway. But a fumble cost her 
the ball and a possible score on the Maroon-and- 
Grey’s twenty-yard line and the latter adopted 
the enemy’s plan and banged at the soldiers’ line 
for fair gains. A forward pass brought the spec¬ 
tators to their feet and gained twenty-two yards 
for Brimfield, Steve Edwards being on the receiv¬ 
ing end of a very pretty play. But Benton stiff¬ 
ened presently and Brimfield was forced to kick. 

That kick spelled disaster for Brimfield. Rol¬ 
lins dropped back to near his own thirty yards 
and sent a remarkable corkscrew punt to Ben¬ 
ton’s twenty. It was one of the prettiest punts 
ever seen on the Brimfield gridiron, for it was so 
long that it went over the quarter-back’s head, so 
high that it enabled the Maroon-and-Grey ends to 
get well down under it and was nicely placed in 
the left-hand corner of the field. The Benton 
quarter made no effort to touch it while it was 
bounding toward the goal line, for with both 
Edwards and Holt hovering about him a fumble 
might easily have resulted, and it was only when 
the pigskin had settled down to a slow, toppling 
roll and it was evident that it did not mean to go 
over the line that the Benton quarter seized it. 


THE WIDTH OF A FINGER 


109 


What happened then was little short of a miracle. 
Both Captain Edwards and Holt took it for 
granted that the quarter-back meant to drop on 
the ball and call it down, and, since there was no 
necessity to smother the opponent, each waited for 
the other to tackle and hold him. But the first 
thing anyone knew the Benton quarter had the 
ball in his hands, had squirmed somehow between 
Edwards and Holt and was speeding up the mid¬ 
dle of the field! 

Between him and the fifty-yard line friend and 
foe were mingled, and to win through seemed a 
preposterous undertaking. And yet first one and 
then another of the enemy was passed, team-mates 
formed hasty interference for the runner and, 
suddenly, to the consternation of the Brimfield 
stand, the quarter, with the ball snuggled in the 
crook of his left elbow, was out of the melee, with 
a clear field before him and two Benton players 
guarding his rear. Crewe made a desperate effort 
to get him near the thirty-yard line, but the in¬ 
terference was too much for him, and after that, 
although Brimfield trailed the runner to the goal 
line and over, there was no doubt as to the result. 
And when the Benton quarter deposited the ball 
squarely between the posts and laid himself down 
beside it friend and foe alike arose from their 


110 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


seats and cheered him long and loudly. Never 
had a more spectacular run been made there, for 
not only had the quarter practically traversed the 
length of the field, but had eluded the entire op¬ 
posing eleven. 

Benton deserved to secure the odd point by kick¬ 
ing goal, but goal-kicking was. the quarter-back’s 
business and he was far too tuckered to try, and 
so the player who did make the attempt failed mis¬ 
erably, and Benton had to be satisfied with those 
six points. Probably she was, for she cheered 
madly and incessantly while the period lasted and 
then spent the half-time singing triumphant 
paeans. And those military academy chaps could 
sing, too! Brimfield, a bit chastened, listened and 
applauded generously and only found her own 
voice when the Maroon-and-Grey warriors trotted 
back again. 

Carmine had given place to McPhee at quarter 
and Holt to Cheep at right end. Otherwise Brim- 
field’s line was the same as in the first half. Mc¬ 
Phee opened his bag of tricks soon after play 
began and double-passes and delayed-passes and 
a certain fake plunge at guard with quarter run¬ 
ning wide outside the drawn-in end made good 
gains and took the ball down the field with only 
one halt to Benton’s twenty-three yards. There 


THE WIDTH OF A FINGER 


111 


the military academy team solved a fake-kick and 
St. Clair was laid low behind his line. Rollins 
made up the lost distance and a little more besides, 
and finally, with the ball on Benton’s nineteen 
yards on fourth down, Captain Edwards called 
for a try-at-goal and Rollins dropped back to the 
thirty. Fortunately the Maroon-and-Grey for¬ 
wards held back the plunging enemy in good style, 
Rollins had all the time he wanted, the pigskin 
dropped neatly over the bar, and the score-board 
figures proclaimed 6 to 3. 

Benton kicked off and once more Brimfield 
started up the field, St. Clair, Tim Otis and Rollins 
banging the line from end to end and Edwards 
varying the monotony by sweeping around behind 
and launching himself off on wide runs. But the 
advance slackened near the middle of the field 
and an attempted forward pass was captured by 
Benton. That play brought the ten-minute period 
to an end. 

Benton tried the Brimfield centre and got 
through for four yards, hit it again and made 
three and placed the ball on the home team’s forty- 
yard line. Time was called for Brimfield and 
Danny Moore trotted on to administer to Gafferty. 
The left guard was soon on his feet again, although 
a trifle unsteady, it seemed, and Benton, with 


112 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


three yards to gain, swung into the other side and 
pushed a half-back through for the distance. Car¬ 
mine replaced McPhee and Holt went back to end 
position. Benton once more thrust at Gafferty 
and, although the secondary defence plugged the 
hole, went through for two yards. Time was 
again called and this time the trainer led Joe GaL 
ferty off the field, the latter protesting bitterly, 
and Harry Walton was hurried in. Benton tried 
a forward pass and made it go for a small gain 
and then, on third down, got past Thayer and 
reached the eighteen before Carmine tipped up 
the runner. Across the gridiron, Benton’s sup¬ 
porters yelled mightily and a second touchdown 
looked imminent. 

Benton fumbled and recovered for a two-yard 
loss and then sent that heroic quarter up the field 
to try a drop kick. It looked easy enough, for the 
ball was near the twenty-eight yards and in front 
of the right hand goal post. Captain Edwards im¬ 
plored his men to block the kick and comparative 
quiet fell over the field. Back shot the ball and 
the quarter’s foot swung at it, but the left side of 
the Benton line crumbled and Hall and Crewe 
flung themselves into the path of the ball. Four 
seconds later it was snuggled under Tim Otis’s 
chest near the thirty-five yards, for Tim had fol- 


THE WIDTH OF A FINGER 113 

lowed the forwards through and trailed the 
bouncing pigskin up the field. 

That misadventure seemed to take the heart 
out of the visitors, and when Brimfield, with new 
courage and determination, smashed at her line 
she fell back time and again. Substitutes were 
sent in lavishly, but although the right side of the 
Benton line stiffened for awhile, the left continued 
weak. Coach Robey sent in Compton to replace 
Steve Edwards and, later, Howard for St. Clair. 
With the best part of five minutes left, Brimfield 
hoped to put over a winning touchdown, and the 
backs responded gallantly to Carmine’s demands. 
Near the enemy’s forty-yard line Rollins threw a 
neat forward to Holt and the latter raced along 
the side of the field for a dozen yards before he 
was forced over the line. That took the ball to 
Benton’s twenty-one. Two tries at the line netted 
but six yards and Compton took the pigskin on 
an end-around play and just made the distance. 

Brimfield hammered the enemy’s left wing and 
reached her five-yard line in three downs, but 
Benton, fiercely determined, her feet on the last 
line mark, was putting up a strong defence. Tom 
Hall, captain pro tern., and Carmine consulted. A 
forward pass might succeed, and if it did would 
win the game, but Benton would be watching for 


114 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


it and neither Holt nor Compton was a brilliant 
catcher of thrown balls. A goal from the field 
would only tie the score, but it seemed the wisest 
play. So Rollins dropped back to the twenty and 
stretched his arms. But Benton was sure a for¬ 
ward was to result and when the ball went back 
her attempts to block the kick were not very en¬ 
thusiastic. That was fortunate for Brimfield, for 
Thursby’s pass had been short and Rollins had to 
pick the ball from the turf before he could swing 
at it. That delay was almost his undoing, since 
the Benton forwards were now trickling through, 
and it was only by the veriest good fortune that 
the ball shot between them from Rollins’s toe and, 
after showing an inclination to pass to the left of 
the goal and changing its mind in mid-air, dropped 
over the bar barely inside the post. Brimfield 
cheered and the 3 on the board changed to 6. 
Coach Robey called Rollins and Tim Otis out, re¬ 
placing them with Martin and Gordon. Brimfield 
kicked off once more and, with a scant minute and 
a half to play, the Maroon-and-Grey tried val¬ 
iantly to add another score. 

Carmine caught on his twenty and took the ball 
to the thirty-six before he was stopped, and Brim¬ 
field cheered wildly and danced about in the stand. 
Plugging the line would never cover that distance 


THE WIDTH OF A FINGER 


115 


to the farther goal line and so Carmine sent Gor¬ 
don off around the left end. But Gordon couldn’t 
find the hole and was run down for no gain. A 
forward pass, Carmine to Compton, laid the ball 
on the forty-eight yards. Howard slid off right 
tackle for six and, on a fake-kick play, Martin ran 
around left end for seven more. Brimfield 
shouted imploringly from the stand and, across 
the field, Benton cheered incessantly, doggedly, 
longing for the whistle. 

The Benton team used all allowable methods to 
waste time. The time-keeper hovered nearby, his 
eyes darting rom the galloping hand of his watch 
to the players. i ‘Twenty-nine seconds,” he re¬ 
sponded to Tom Hall’s question. Carmine clapped 
his hands impatiently. 

“Signals now! Make this good! Left tackle 
over! 27—57—88—16! Hep! 27—57—88-”• 

The backs swung obliquely to the right, Carmine 
dropped from sight, his back to the line, Benton’s 
left side was borne slowly away, fighting hard, and 
confusion reigned. Then Carmine whirled 
around, sprang, doubled over, through the scat¬ 
tered right side of the enemy’s line, challenged 
only by the end, who made a desperate attempt at 
a tackle but failed, and, with only the opposing 
quarter between him and the goal line, raced like 



116 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


the wind. About him was a roaring babel of 
sound, voices urging him on, shouts of dismay, 
imploring shrieks from behind. Then the quarter 
was before him, crouching with out-reached hands, 
a strained, anxious look on his dirt-streaked face. 

They met near the twenty-yard line. The Ben¬ 
ton quarter launched himself forward. Carmine 
swung to the left and leaped. A hand groped at 
his ankle, caught, and Carmine fell sprawling to 
the turf. But he found his feet like a cat, 
wrenched the imprisoned ankle free and went 
staggering, stumbling on. Again he fell, on the 
five-yard line, and again the Benton quarter dived 
for him. But Carmine was not to be stopped with 
the line only five short yards away. He wrested 
himself to his feet again, the arms of the Benton 
quarter squirming about his knees, plunged on a 
stride, dragging the enemy with him, found his 
legs locked firmly now, struggled desperately and 
then flung himself sidewise toward the last white 
streak. And as he fell his hands, clasping the ball, 
reached forward and a whistle blew. 

It was said afterward that a half-inch decided 
that touchdown. And the half-inch was on the 
wrong side of the line! Carmine wept frankly 
when he heard the decision and Tom Hall had to 
be held away from the referee, but facts were facts 


. THE WIDTH OF A FINGER 117 

and Carmine had lost his touchdown and Brimfield 
the victory by the width of a finger! 

Benton departed joyously, cheering and singing, 
and Brimfield tried hard to be satisfied with a 
drawn game. But she wasn't very successful, and 
for the next few days the referee's decision was 
discussed and derided and regretted. 

What sorrow Don felt was largely mitigated 
when, after supper that evening, Steve Edwards 
found him in front of Billings. “You come to us 
Monday, Don," said the captain. “Robey told me 
to tell you. Joe Gafferty's got a rib caved in and 
is out of it for a fortnight at least. Get Tim to 
coach you up on the signals. Don't forget." 

As though he was likely to! 


CHAPTER X 


TIM EXULTS AND EXPLAINS 

When Don told Tim the latter insisted on per¬ 
forming a triumphal dance about the room to the 
tune of “Boola.” When Don squirmed himself 
loose Tim continued alone until the droplight was 
knocked to the floor at the cost of one green shade. 
Then he threw himself, panting but jubilant, on his 
bed and hilariously kicked his feet in air. Don 
observed him with a faint smile. 

“You wooden Indian, you!” exclaimed Tim, 
sitting up and dropping his feet to the floor with 
a crash. ‘ ‘ There you stand like a—a graven im¬ 
age, looking as though you’d just received an in¬ 
vitation to a funeral! Cheer, you idiot! Make a 
noise! Aren’t you tickled to death?” 

“You bet I am!” replied Don. 

“Well, do something, then! You ought to have 
a little of my Latin temperament, Don. You’d be 
a heap easier to live with. If it was I who had 
just been waited on humbly by the first team cap¬ 
tain and invited to join the eleven I’d—I’d make 
a—a noise!” 


118 


TIM EXULTS AND EXPLAINS 119 


“What do you think you’ve been doing?” 
laughed Don. “You’ll have Horace in here in a 
minute. Steve says you’re to coach me on the 
signals.” 

“Tomorrow!” Tim waved his hand. “Time 
enough for that, Don. Just now it behooves us to 
celebrate.” 

“How?” asked Don. 

Tim thought long and earnestly. Finally, 
“Let’s borrow Larry Jones’s accordion and sere¬ 
nade Josh!” he said. 

“Let’s not. And let’s not go to a fire, either! 
Think of something better, Timmy. ’ ’ 

“Then we’ll go out and bay at the moon. 
I’ve got to do something! By the time 
Joe’s got his busted rib mended you’ll have 
that left guard position nailed to the planks, 
Don.” 

“How about Walton?” asked Don dubiously. 

“A fig for Walton! Two figs for him! A whole 
box of figs! All you’ve got to do is speed up a bit 
and-” « 

“Suppose I can’t?” 

“Suppose nothing! You’ve got to! If you 
don’t you ’ll have me to fight, Donald. If you don’t 
cinch that position in just one week I—I’ll take 
you over my knee and spank you with a belt! 


120 LEFT GUARD GILBERT 

Come on over to Clint’s room. Let us disseminate 

the glorious tidings. Let us-” 

“I’d rather learn the signals,” said Don. 
< t There’s only tonight and tomorrow, you know. ’ ’ 
Tim appealed despairingly to the ceiling with 
wide-spread hands. “There’s no poetry in his 
soul,” he mourned, “no blood in his veins!” He 
faced Don scornfully. “Donald P. Gilbert is your 
name, my son, and the P stands for Practical. All 
right, then, draw up a chair and let’s have it over. 
To think, though, that I should have to sit indoors 
a night like this and teach signals to a wooden- 
head! I wooden do it for anyone else. Ha! 
How’s that! Get a pad and a pencil and try to 
look intelligent.” 

‘ ‘ All right! Mark ’em down, then. Starting at 
the left, number your holes 1, 3, 5, 7, 8, 6, 4, 2. Got 
that! Number your left end 1, the next man 3, 
the next 5. Omit centre. Right guard 6, right 
tackle 4, right end 2. Now, your backfield. Quar¬ 
ter 0, left half 7, right half 8, full-back 9. ’ ’ 

“Gee, that’s hard to remember,” murmured 
Don. 

“And hard to guess,” answered Tim. “Now, 
your first number, unless it’s under thirty, is a 
fake. If it’s under thirty it means that the next 
number is the number of a play. Over thirty, it 


TIM EXULTS AND EXPLAINS 121 


means nothing. Your second digit of your second 
number is your runner. The second digit of the 
third number is the hole. The fourth number, as 
you doubtless surmise, is also a fake. Now, then, 
sir! 65—47—23—98! What is it!” 

“Left half between end and tackle.” 

“On the left. Correct. 19—87—77—29!” 

“I don’t know. Nineteen calls for a numbered 
play.” 

“Right again, Mr. Gilbert, your performance is 
startling! The pity of it is, though, that about 
the time you get these signals pat Robey’ll change 
them for the Claflin game. So far we’ve only got 
eight numbered plays, and they aren’t compli¬ 
cated. Want to go into them tonight!” 

“No, I guess not. I’d rather get these holes 
and players sort of fixed in my mind first. We’ll 
go over the plays tomorrow, if you don’t mind.” 

“It will break my heart, but I’ll do it for you. 
Now will you come over to Clint’s!” 

“I’d rather not, Tim. You go. I want to mull 
over these signals.” 

Presently, having exhausted his vocabulary on 
his room-mate, Tim went. Don settled his head 
in his hands and studied the numbered diagram 
for the better part of an hour. Don was slow at 
memorising, but what was once forced into his 


122 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


mind stayed there. A little before ten o’clock he 
slipped the diagram under a box in a bureau 
drawer and went to bed with a calm mind, and 
when Tim returned riotously a few minutes later 
Don was sleeping peacefully. 

On Monday, in chapel, Don and the “heroes” of 
Farmer Corrigan’s conflagration had another 
shock, and Don, for one, wondered when he was 
to hear the last of that affair. “Since last week,” 
said Mr. Fernald drily, “when I requested the 
four boys who helped to put out a fire at the Cor¬ 
rigan farm to make themselves known to an ad¬ 
miring public, I have gained an understanding of 
their evident desire to conceal their identities. I 
am forced to the conclusion that it was not alto¬ 
gether modesty that kept them silent. The fire, it 
appears, did not break out until nearly half-past 
nine. Consequently the young gentlemen were 
engaged in their heroic endeavours at a time when 
they should have been in their dormitories. I have 
not yet found out who they were, but I am making 
earnest efforts to do so. Meanwhile, if they wish 
to lighten the consequences of their breach of 
school regulations, I’d earnestly advise them to 
call and see me. I may add that, in view of the 
unusual circumstances, had they made a clean 
breast of the affair I should have dealt very 


TIM EXULTS AND EXPLAINS 123 


leniently with them. That is all, I think. Dis¬ 
missed. 7 J 

None of the culprits dared to so much as glance 
at the others on the way out of the hall, hut after¬ 
ward, when breakfast was over, they gathered 
anxiously together in Number 6 Billings and dis¬ 
cussed the latest development with lowered voices, 
like a quartette of anarchists arranging a bomb 
party. 

“He’s right up on his ear, 77 said Clint gloom¬ 
ily. “If he gets us now he will send us all pack¬ 
ing, and don’t you doubt it! 77 

“Piffle! 77 This from Tim, the least impressed 
of the four. “Probation is all we 7 d get. Didn’t 
the paper say we were heroes? 77 

“No, it didn’t,” answered Tom shortly. “And 
I wish that paper was in Halifax!” 

“Might as well be fired as put on pro,” said 
Clint. “It would mean no more football this year 
for any of us. My word, wouldn’t Robey be 
mad!” 

‘ i Wouldn 7 t I be! 77 growled Tom. ‘ 1 Look here, 
do you really suppose he’s trying to find out who 
we were, or was that just a bluff to scare us into 
’fessing up?” 

“Josh isn’t much of a bluffer,” observed Don 
judiciously. “What he says he means. What I 


124 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


don’t savvy is why he hasn’t found out already. 
Every hall master has a record of leaves.” 

“Yes, but it was Saturday night and I’ll bet 
half the school had leave,” said Tim. “I dare 
say, though, that if any fellows are suspected 
we’re amongst ’em, Don. Being on the first floor, 
Josh knows we could sneak in easily. Still, he 
can’t prove it on us.” 

“I’m not so sure,” replied Don thoughtfully. 
“Suppose he asked Mr. Brady?” 

A dismayed silence ensued until Tom laughed 
mirthlessly. 

“That’s one on us,” he said. “We never 
thought of that. Maybe he has asked Brady 
already. ’ ’ 

“Brady doesn’t know our names,” said Tim. 
“You didn’t tell him, did you, Don?” 

“No, he didn’t ask. But he could easily de¬ 
scribe us so that Josh would recognise us, I 
guess.” 

“That’s the trouble with being so plaguy dis¬ 
tinguished looking,” mourned Tim. “Seems to 
me, fellows, that there’s just one thing to be did, 
and did sudden.” 

“You mean warn Mr. Brady?” asked Clint'. 

“Exactly, my discerning young friend. Maybe 
the horse is stolen-” 


TIM EXULTS AND EXPLAINS 125 


“What horse t” asked Tom perplexedly. 

“Merely a figure of speech, Tom. I was about 
to observe when so rudely interrupted-” 

“Oh, cut out the verbiage,” growled Tom. 

“That possibly it was too late to lock the stable 
door,” continued Tim, “but we’d better do it, 
just the same. Let’s see if he has a telephone.” 

“Of course he has,” said Clint, “but I don’t 
think it would be safe to call him up. We’d bet¬ 
ter see him. Or write him a letter.” 

“He wouldn’t get a letter until tomorrow, 
maybe,” objected Don. “One of us had better 
beat it over to his place as soon as possible and 
ask him to keep mum. ’ ’ 

“I can’t go,” said Tom. “I’ve got four recits 
this morning and Robey would never let me off 
practice.” 

“I don’t believe any of us will do much work 
this afternoon,” said Tim. “I’ll go if Robey’ll 
let me cut. I wish someone would come along, 
though. It’s a dickens of a trip to make alone. 
You come, Clint.” 

“I will if I can. We’ll ask Robey at dinner. 
What shall we say to this Brady man ? ’ ’ 

“Just tell him what’s doing and ask him to for¬ 
get what we looked like if Josh writes to him or 
calls him up or anything. Brady’s a good old 


126 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


scout, I’ll bet,” added Tim with conviction. 

4 'Maybe we’d better buy a setting of eggs to get 
on the good side of him. ’ ’ 

"Don’t be a chump,” begged Tim. "I don’t 
call this a comedy situation, if you do, Tim. I’d 
certainly hate to get on pro and have to drop 
football!” 

"Don’t be a chump,” begged Tom. "I don’t 
say it’s a comedy, but there’s no use weeping, is 
there? What’s done is done, and we’ve got to 
make the best of it, and a laugh never hurt any¬ 
one yet.” 

"Well, then, let’s make the best of it,” an¬ 
swered Tom peevishly. "Talking doesn’t do any 
good.” 

"Neither does grouching,” said Tim sweetly. 
"You leave it all to Clint and me, Tom. We’re a 
swell pair of fixers. If we can get to Brady before 
Josh does we’re all right. And it’s a safe wager 
Josh hasn’t asked Brady yet, for if he had he’d 
be on to us. There’s the nine o’clock bell, fellows, 
and I’ve got a recit. See you later. Hope for 
the best, Tom, and fear the worst!” 

Tim seized his books and dashed out, followed 
more leisurely by Clint. Tom remained a few min¬ 
utes longer and then he, too, took his departure, 
still filled with forebodings. Don, left to himself, 


TIM EXULTS AND EXPLAINS 127 


drew a chair to the table and began to study. 
Truth, however, compels me to state that what he 
studied was not his German, although he had a 
recitation coming in forty minutes, but two sheets 
of buff paper torn from a scratch-pad and filled 
with writing interspersed with numerals and 
adorned with strange diagrams, in short, Tim’s 
elucidation of the eight numbered plays which up 
to the present comprised Brimfield’s budget of 
tricks. It can’t be said that Don covered himself 
with glory in Mr. Daley’s German class that morn¬ 
ing or that the instructor was at all satisfied, but 
Don had the secret satisfaction of knowing that 
stored away in the back of his brain was a very 
thorough knowledge of the Brimfield football sig¬ 
nal code and of Mr. Robey’s special plays, 


CHAPTER XI 


ME. BEADY FOEGETS 

That afternoon Don’s knowledge stood him in 
good stead, for with more than half the first-string 
players excused from practice, his services were 
called on at the start, and, with McPhee and Cot¬ 
ter running the squad, the signal drill was long 
and thorough. Harry Walton viewed Don’s ad¬ 
vent with disfavour. That was apparent to Don 
and anyone else who thought of the matter, 
although he pretended a good-natured indiffer¬ 
ence that wasn’t at all deceiving. Don more than 
once caught his rival observing him with resent¬ 
ment and dislike, and, remembering that Harry 
Walton had been a witness of his unconventional 
return to hall that night, he experienced misgiv¬ 
ings. Of course, Harry wouldn’t “peach,” but— 
well, Don again wished anyone rather than Harry 
had stumbled on the secret. 

But he didn’t have much time for worrying 
about that matter, for Coach Robey went after 
them hard that day. In the practice game with 
the second team Don started at left guard and 
128 


MR. BRADY FORGETS 


129 


played the position until within a few minutes of 
the whistle. Then Harry Walton, who had been dis- 
gruntedly adorning the bench, took his place. He 
didn’t look at Don as he accepted the latter’s 
head-guard, but Don was well aware that Harry 
felt anything but good-will for him. Naturally 
enough, Harry had, Don reflected, expected to step 
into Gafferty’s place without opposition when 
news of the extent of the latter’s injury had be¬ 
come known, and it was undoubtedly a big disap¬ 
pointment to him to discover that he had to fight 
a new opponent. Don could sympathise with 
Harry, for he had endured disappointments him¬ 
self during his brief football career, but it is diffi¬ 
cult to sympathise very enthusiastically when the 
subject of your sympathy shows his dislike for 
you, and Don metaphorically shrugged his shoul¬ 
ders as he trotted up to the gymnasium. 

“It isn’t my fault,” he said to himself. “I 
didn’t bust Joe Gafferty’s rib and I’m not respon¬ 
sible for Robey’s taking me on the first team. 
Walton will just have to make the best of it.” 

Don couldn’t flatter himself that he had played 
that afternoon with especial brilliancy, although 
he had managed to hold his end up fairly well. 
The fact w T as that he had been so intent on getting 
speeded into his performance that he had rather 


130 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


skimped tlie niceties of line-play. And he wasn’t 
at all certain that he had shown any more speed 
than usual, either. He awaited Mr. Robey’s ap¬ 
pearance in the locker-room with some apprehen¬ 
sion, certain that if he had erred badly he would 
soon learn of it. When the coach did arrive at the 
tail of the procession of panting players and said 
his say without once singling out Don for special 
attention, the latter was relieved. He couldn’t, he 
told himself, have done so very badly, after all! 

Tom walked back to Billings with Don to learn 
the result of Tim’s and Clint’s embassy to the 
Cedar Ridge Poultry Farm, for the two had ob¬ 
tained leave of absence from Mr. Robey and had 
set forth on their journey the minute a three 
o’clock recitation was finished. Tim wasn’t in 
Number 6 when they reached it, but he and Clint 
tramped in soon after, dusty and weary but evi¬ 
dently triumphant. Tim narrated their experi¬ 
ences. 

“ Missed the three-fifty car, just as I told Clint 
we would if he didn’t hustle-” 

* ‘I had to find a cap to wear, didn’t I?” inter¬ 
polated Clint. 

“Well, we found the place all right, fellows, and, 
say, it’s some poultry farm, believe me, dearies! 
Isn’t it corking, Clint!” 



MR. BRADY FORGETS 131 

Clint grunted assent, stretching tired legs across 
the floor. 

“ There's about a thousand acres of it, I guess, 
and a mile of red chicken houses and runs, or 
whatever you call 'em. How many hens and 
things did he tell us he had, Clint ?” 

“Eighteen hundred, I think. Maybe it was 
eighteen thousand. I don't remember. All I 
know is there were chickens as far as you could 
see, and then some.” 

“Never mind the descriptive matter,” urged 
Tom. 4 ‘ What did he say ? Had Josh been at him 1 
Did he promise-” 

“I'm coming to that, dearie. When we found 
him he was doing something to that car of his in 
a cute little garage. And, say, it's an eight-cylin¬ 
der Lothrop, and a regular jim-dandy! Well, he 
took us into his house first-” 

Tom groaned in despair. 

“-And fed us on crackers and cake and gin¬ 

ger ale. Say, he's got a peach of a bungalow there; 
small but entire; and a cute little Jap who cooks 
and looks after things for him. Well, then he 
took us out and showed us around the place. 
Chickens! Gee, I didn't know there were so many 
in the world! And we saw the incubators and the 
—what you call them—brooders, and ” 



132 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“For the love of mud!” exclaimed Tom. 
“Can’t you get down to dots? Is it all right or 
isn’t it?” 

Tim smiled exasperatingly. “Then he showed 
us-” 

Tom arose to his feet and took a step toward 
him. 

“It’s all right,” said Tim hurriedly. “Every¬ 
thing, Thomas! We told him what was up and 
how we didn’t want Josh to find out it was us 
who attended Mr. Corrigan’s fire party and 
asked him if he would please not remember 
what we looked like if Josh asked him. And he 
said-” 

“He laughed,” interrupted Clint, and chuckled 
himself. 

“That’s right! He laughed a lot. ‘ You ’re a 
little bit late,’ he said. ‘Mr. Fernald called me up 
by telephone nearly a week ago, fellows, and 
wanted to know all about it.’ ‘You didn’t tell 
him?’ I yelped. ‘No, I couldn’t,’ he said. ‘You 
see, you hadn’t told me your names, and it was 
pretty dark that night and somehow or other I just 
couldn’t seem to recall what you looked like! Mr. 
Fernald sounded considerably disappointed and 
like he didn’t quite believe me, but that can’t be 
helped. ’ Say, fellows, I wanted to hug him! Or— 


MR. BRADY FORGETS 


133 


or buy an egg or something! Honest, I did! 
He's all right, what?” 

u He’s a corker ! 91 said Tom, sighing with relief. 
“You don't suppose Corrigan or any of the others 
there that night would remember us, do you?” 

“Not likely. Mr. Brady didn't think so, any¬ 
way.” 

‘ ‘ Then it's all to the merry!'' cried Tom. 11 Gee, 
but that's a load off my mind!” 

“Off your what?” asked Tim curiously. 

“It's all right if Harry Walton keeps quiet,” 
said Don. “If he gets to talking-” 

“If he does I'll beat him up,” said Tim ear¬ 
nestly. “But he won't. He wouldn’t be such a 
snip, in the first place, and he wouldn’t dare to in 
the second.” 

“N-no, I guess not,” agreed Don. But his tone 
didn't hold much conviction. “Only, if-” 

“I'll tell you fellows one thing,” announced 
Tom vehemently. 

“Don't strain yourself,” advised. Tim. 

“And that,” continued the other, scowling at 
the interruption, “is that no one gets me into any 
more scrapes until after the Claflin game!'' 

“Gee, to hear you talk,” exclaimed Tim indig¬ 
nantly, “anyone would think we'd tied you up 
with a rope and forcibly abducted you! Who's 


134 LEFT GUARD GILBERT 

idea was it, anyway, to go to the village that 
night ?” 

“Yours, if you want to know! I don’t say I 
didn’t go along willingly enough, Tim. What I 
do say is —never again! Anyway,” he added, 
“not until football’s over!” 

Morgan’s School, which had defeated Brimfield 
the year before, 6 to 3, came and departed. Brim- 
field took the visitor’s measure this time, and, 
although she only scored one touchdown and failed 
to kick goal, the contest was far less close and in¬ 
teresting than the score would suggest. Brim- 
field played the opponents to a standstill in the 
first half and scored just before the end of it. In 
the third quarter Coach Robey began substituting 
and when the last ten minutes started the Maroon- 
and-Grey had only three first-string fellows in her 
line-up. The substitutes played good football and, 
while not able to push the pigskin across Morgan’s 
line, twice reached her fifteen yards and twice 
tried and narrowly missed a goal from the field. 

On the whole it could not be said that Brim- 
field’s performance that blustery Saturday after¬ 
noon was impressive, for she was frequently 
caught napping on the defensive, showed periods 
of apathy and did more fumbling, none of which 
resulted disastrously, than she should have. Tim 


MR. BRADY FORGETS 


135 


Otis had a remarkably good day and was unde¬ 
niably the best man in the backfield for the home 
team. Carmine played a heady, snappy game, and 
Don, who played the most of three quarters at left 
guard, conducted himself very well. Don’s work 
was never of the spectacular sort, but at his best 
he was a steady and thoroughly reliable lineman 
and very effective on defence. He was still slow 
in getting into plays, a fact which made him of less 
value than Joe Gafferty on attack. Even Harry 
Walton showed up better than Don when Brimfield 
had the ball. But neither Gafferty nor Walton 
was as strong on defence as Don. 

Walton had been very earnestly striving all the 
week to capture the guard position, but the fact 
that Don had been played through most of 
the Morgan’s game indicated that the latter 
was as yet a slight favourite in Coach Robey’s 
estimation. During the week succeeding the 
Morgan’s game the two rivals kept at it 
nip and tuck, and their team-mates looked on 
with interest. At practice Mr. Robey showed no 
favour to either, and each came in for his full 
share of criticism, but when, the next Saturday, 
the team journeyed away from home and played 
Cherry Valley, it was again Don who started the 
game between Thayer and Thursby and who re- 


136 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


mained in the line-up until the fourth period, by 
which time Brimfield had piled up the very satis¬ 
factory score of twenty-six points. In the final 
five minutes Cherry Valley managed to fool the 
visitors and get a forward pass off for a gain 
that placed the ball on Brimfield’s fourteen 
yards, and from there her drop-kicker put the 
pigskin over the cross-bar and tallied three points. 
The game was uninteresting unless one was a par¬ 
tisan, and even then there were few thrills. Brim- 
field played considerably better than in the Mor¬ 
gan’s game and emerged with no more important 
damages than a wrenched ankle, which fell to the 
share of Martin, who had taken Rollins’s place in 
the last period. 

Joe Gafferty came back to practice the following 
Monday, but was missing again a day or two 
later, and the school heard with some dismay 
that’s Joe’s parents had written to Mr. Fernald 
and forbidden Joe to play any more football that 
year. Joe was inconsolable and went around for 
the next week or so looking like a lost soul. After 
that he accepted the situation and helped Mr. 
Boutelle coach the second. That second had by 
that time been shaken together into a very capable 
and smooth-running team, a team which was giv¬ 
ing the first more and more trouble every day. 


MR. BRADY FORGETS 


137 


Coach Robey had again levied on it for a player, 
taking Merton to the first when Gafferty was lost 
to him, and again Mr. Boutelle growled and pro¬ 
tested and, finally, philosophically shrugged his 
shoulders. A week later Merton was released to 
the second once more and Pryme, who had been 
playing at right guard as a substitute for Tom 
Hall, was tried out on the other side of centre with 
good results. Pryme’s advent as a contender for 
the left guard position complicated the battle be¬ 
tween Don and Harry Walton, and until after the 
Southby game the trio of candidates indulged in 
a three-cornered struggle that was quite pretty to 
watch. 

Unfortunately for Don, that struggle for 
supremacy threatened to affect his class standing, 
for it occupied so much of his thought that there 
was little left for study. When, however, the 
office dropped a hint and Mr. Daley presented an 
ultimatum, Don realised that he was taking foot¬ 
ball far too seriously, and, being a rather level¬ 
headed youth, he mended his ways. He expected, 
as a result, to find himself left behind in the race 
with Walton and Pryme, but, oddly enough, his 
game was in no degree affected so far as he could 
determine. In fact, within a few days the situa¬ 
tion was simplified by the practical elimination of 


138 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


Pryme as a contender. This happened when, just 
before the Southby game, Tom Hall, together with 
eight other members of Mr. Moller ’s physics class 
went on probation, and Pryme was needed at right 
guard. 

I have mentioned Tom’s probation very cas¬ 
ually, quite as if it was a matter of slight impor¬ 
tance, but you may be sure that the school viewed 
it in no such way. Coming as it did little more 
than a fortnight before the big game, it was looked 
on as a dire catastrophe, no more and no less; and 
the school, which had laughed and chuckled over 
the incident which had caused the catastrophe, 
and applauded the participants in it, promptly 
turned their thumbs down when the effect became 
known and indignantly dubbed the affair “ silly 
kid’s play” and blamed Tom very heartily. How 
much of the blame he really deserved you shall 
judge for yourself, but the affair merits a chapter 
of its own. 


CHAPTER Xn 


THE JOKE ON MR. MOLLER 

Amy Byrd started it. 

Or, perhaps, in the last analysis, Mr. Holler 
began it himself. Mr. Moller’s first name was 
Caleb, a fact which the school was quick to seize 
on. At first he was just ‘ ‘ Caleb,’ 1 then ‘ * Caleb the 
Conqueror,’’ and, finally, “The Conqueror.” 
The “Conqueror” part of it was added in recog¬ 
nition of Mr. Moller’s habit of attiring himself for 
the class room as for an afternoon tea. He was a 
new member of the faculty that fall and Brimfield 
required more than the few weeks which had 
elapsed since his advent to grow accustomed to his 
grandeur of apparel. Mr. Caleb Moller was a 
good-looking, in fact quite a handsome young man 
of twenty-five or six, well-built, tall and the proud 
possessor of a carefully trimmed moustache and 
Vandyke beard, the latter probably cultivated in 
the endeavour to add to his apparent age. He 
affected light grey trousers, fancy waistcoats of 
inoffensive shades, a frock coat, grey gaiters and 
patent leather shoes. His scarf was always 
139 


140 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


pierced with a small black pearl pin. There’s no 
denying that Mr. Moller knew how to dress or 
that the effect was pleasing. But Brimfield wasn’t 
educated to such magnificence and Brimfield 
gasped loudly the first time Mr. Moller burst on 
its sight. Afterward it laughed until the novelty 
began to wear off. Mr. Moller was a capable 
instructor and a likeable man, although it took 
Brimfield all of the first term to discover the latter 
fact owing to the master’s dignified aloofness. 
Being but a scant eight years the senior of some 
of his pupils, he perhaps felt it necessary to em¬ 
phasise his dignity a little. By the last of October, 
however, the school had accepted Mr. Moller and 
was, possibly, secretly a little proud to have for a 
member of its faculty one who possessed such 
excellent taste in the matter of attire. He was 
universally voted “a swell dresser,” and not a 
few of the older fellows set themselves to a mod¬ 
est emulation of his style. There remained, how¬ 
ever, many unregenerate youths who continued to 
poke fun at “The Conqueror,” and of these was 
Amy Byrd. 

It isn’t beyond the bounds of reason that jeal¬ 
ousy may have had something to do with Amy’s 
attitude, for Amy was “a swell dresser” himself 
and had a fine eye for effects of colour. Amy’s 


THE JOKE ON MR. MOLLER 141 


combinations of lavender or dull rose or pearl- 
grey shirts, socks and ties were recognised master¬ 
pieces of sartorial achievement. The trouble with 
Amy was that when the tennis season was over 
he had nothing to interest himself in aside from 
maintaining a fairly satisfactory standing in class, 
and I’m sorry to say that Amy didn’t find the 
latter undertaking wildly exciting. He was, there¬ 
fore, an excellent subject for the mischief microbe, 
and the mischief microbe had long since discov¬ 
ered the fact. Usually Amy’s escapades were 
harmless enough; for that matter, the present one 
was never intended to lead to any such unfor¬ 
tunate results as actually attended it; and in jus¬ 
tice to Amy it should be distinctly stated that he 
would never have gone into the affair had he fore¬ 
seen the end of it. But he couldn’t see any further 
into the future than you or I, and so—yes, on the 
whole, I think it may be fairly said that Amy 
Byrd started it. 

It was on a Tuesday, what time Amy should 
have been deep in study, that Clint Thayer, across 
the table, had his attention wrested from his book 
by the sound of deep, mirthful chuckles. He 
glanced over questioningly. Amy continued to 
chuckle until, being bidden to share the joke or 
shut up, he took Clint into his confidence. Clint 


142 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


was forced to chuckle some himself when he had 
heard Amy through, but the chuckles were fol¬ 
lowed by earnest efforts to dissuade his friend 
from his proposed scheme. 

“He won’t stand for it, Amy,” Clint protested. 
“He will report the lot of you to Josh and you’ll 
be in a peck of trouble. It would be terribly funny, 
all right, but you’d better not try it.” 

“Funny! My friend, it would be excruciating! 
And I certainly am going to have a stab at it. 
Let’s see who will go into it. Steve Edwards— 
no, Steve wouldn’t, of course. Tom Hall will, I’ll 
bet. And Roy Draper and Harry Wescott, prob¬ 
ably. We ought to get as many of the fellows as 
we can. I wish you were in that class, Clint. ’ ’ 

“I don’t. You’re a chump to try such a trick, 
Amy. You’ll get pro for sure. Maybe worse. I 
don’t believe Moller can take a joke; he’s too 
haughty.” 

“Oh, rot! He will take it all right. Anyway, 
what kick can he have? We fellows have just as 
much right to-” 

“You’ll wish you hadn’t,” said Clint. “See if 
you don’t!” 

Clint’s prophecy proved true, and Amy did wish 
he hadn’t, but that was some days later, and just 
now he was far too absorbed in planning his little 



THE JOKE ON MR. MOLLER 143 


joke to trouble himself about what might happen 
as a result. As soon as study hour was over he 
departed precipitately from Number 14 Torrence 
and Clint saw no more of him until bedtime. Then 
his questions met only with more chuckles and 
evasion. 

The result did not appear until two days later, 
which brings our tale to the forenoon of that un¬ 
lucky Thursday preceeding the Southby contest. 
Mr. Moller’s class in Physics 2 met at eleven 
o’clock that morning. Physics was an elective 
course with the Fifth Form and a popular one, 
many of the fellows taking it only to fill out their 
necessary eighteen hours a week. Mr. Moller, at¬ 
tired as usual with artistic nicety, sat in his swivel 
chair, facing the windows, and drummed softly on 
the top of the desk with immaculate finger-tips 
and waited for the class to assemble. 

Had he been observing the arriving students in¬ 
stead of the tree-tops outside he might have 
noticed the peculiar fact that this morning, as 
though by common consent, the students were 
avoiding the first two rows of seats nearest the 
platform. But he didn’t notice it. In fact, he 
didn’t turn his head until the gong in the lower 
hall struck and, simultaneously, there sounded in 
the room the carefully-timed tread of many feet. 


144 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


Then “The Conqueror” swung around in his 
chair, felt for the black ribbon which held his tor¬ 
toise shell glasses and, in the act of lifting the 
glasses to his well-shaped nose, paused and stared. 

Down the side aisle of the room, keeping step, 
grave of mien, walked nine boys led by the sober- 
countenanced Amy Byrd. Each was attired in as 
near an approach to Mr. Moller’s style as had been 
possible with the wardrobes at command. Not all 
—in fact, only two—wore frock coats, and not all 
had been able to supply themselves with light grey 
trousers, but the substitutions were very effective, 
and in no case was a fancy waistcoat wanting. 
Wing collars encircled every throat, grey silk 
scarves were tied with careful precision, stick¬ 
pins were at the proper careless tilt, spats, some 
grey, some tan, some black, covered each ankle, a 
handkerchief protruded a virgin corner from 
every right sleeve and over every vest dangled a 
black silk ribbon. That only a few of them ended 
in glasses was merely because the supply of those 
aids to vision had proved inadequate to the de¬ 
mand. Soberly and amidst an appalling silence 
the nine exquisites paced to the front of the room 
and disposed themselves in the first two rows. 

Mr. Moller, his face extremely red, watched 
without word or motion. The rest of the class, 


THE JOKE ON MR. MOLLER 145 


their countenances too showing an unnatural rud¬ 
diness, likewise maintained silence and immobility 
until the last of the nine had shuffled his feet into 
place. Then there burst upon the stillness a snig¬ 
ger which, faint as it was, sounded startingly loud. 
Whereupon pent up emotions broke loose and 
a burst of laughter went up that shook the 
windows. 

It seemed for a minute that that laughter would 
never stop. Fellows rolled in their seats and beat 
futilely on the arms of their chairs, gasping for 
breath and sobriety. And through it all Mr. 
Moller stared in a sort of dazed amazement. And 
then, when the laughter had somewhat abated, he 
arose, one hand on the desk and the other agi¬ 
tatedly fingering his black ribbon, and the colour 
poured out of his cheeks, leaving them strangely 
pallid. And Amy, furtively studying him, knew 
that Clint had been right, that Mr. Moller couldn’t 
take a joke, or, in any event, had no intention of 
taking this one. Amy wasn’t frightened for him¬ 
self, in fact he wasn’t frightened at all, but he did 
experience a twinge of regret for the others whom 
he had led into the affair. Then Mr. Moller was 
speaking and Amy forgot regrets and listened. 

“I am going to give you young gentlemen”— 
was it imagination on Amy’s part or had the in- 


146 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


structor placed the least bit of emphasis on the 
last word—“two minutes more in which to recover 
from your merriment. At the end of that time I 
shall expect you to be quiet and orderly and ready 
to begin this recitation. ’ ’ He drew his watch from 
his pocket and laid it on the desk. 11 So that you 
may enjoy this—this brilliant jest to the full, I’ll 
ask the nine young gentleman in the front rows 
to stand up and face you. If you please, Hall, 
Stearns, Draper, Fanning, Byrd-” 

It was several seconds before this request was 
responded to. Then Amy arose and, one by one, 
the others followed and faced the room. Amy 
managed to retain his expression of calm inno¬ 
cence, but the others were ill at ease and many 
faces looked very sheepish. 

“Now, then,” announced Mr. Moller quietly. 
“Begin, please. You have two minutes.” 

A dismal silence ensued, a silence broken at in¬ 
tervals by a nervous cough or the embarrassed 
shuffling of feet. Mr. Moller calmly divided his 
attention between the class and the watch. Surely 
never had one hundred and twenty seconds ticked 
themselves away so slowly. There was a notice¬ 
able disinclination on the part of the students to 
meet the gaze of the instructor, nor did they seem 
any more eager to view the various and generally 


THE JOKE ON MR. MOLLER 147 


painful emotions expressed on the countenances 
of the nine. At last Mr. Moller took up his watch 
and returned it with its dangling fob to his pocket, 
and as he did so some thirty sighs of relief 
sounded in the stillness. 

“Time’s up,” announced the instructor. “Be 
seated, young gentlemen. Thank you very much. ’ * 
The nine sank gratefully into their chairs. “Iam 
sure that we have all enjoyed your joke vastly. 
You must pardon me if, just at first, I seemed to 
miss the humour of it. I can assure you that I 
am now quite—quite sympathique. We are told 
that imitation is the sincerest flattery, and I accept 
the compliment in the spirit in which you have 
tendered it. Again I thank you.’ 7 

Mr. Moller bowed gravely and sat down. 

Glances, furtive and incredulous, passed from 
boy to boy. Amy heaved a sigh of relief. After 
all, then, Mr. Moller could take a joke! And for 
the first time since the inception of the brilliant 
idea Amy felt an emotion very much like regret! 
And then the recitation began. 

That would have ended the episode had not 
Chance taken a hand in affairs. Mr. Fernald very 
seldom visited a class room during recitations. 
One could count such occurrences on one hand and 
the result would have sufficed for the school year. 


148 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


And yet today, for some reason never apparent 
to the boys, Mr. Fernald happened in. 

Harry Westcott was holding forth when the 
principal’s tread caught his attention. Westcott 
turned his head, saw and instantly stopped. 

“ Proceed, Westcott,’’ said Mr. Fernald. 

Westcott continued, stammeringly and much at 
random. Mr. Fernald quietly walked up the aisle 
to the platform. Mr. Moller arose and for a mo¬ 
ment the two spoke in low tones. Then the prin¬ 
cipal nodded, smiled and turned to retrace his 
steps. As he did so his smiling regard fell upon 
the occupants of the two front rows. A look of 
puzzlement banished the smile. Bewilderment 
followed that. Westcott faltered and stopped 
altogether. A horrible silence ensued. Then Mr. 
Fernald turned an inquiring look upon the in¬ 
structor. 

“May I ask,” he said coldly, “what this—this 
quaint exhibition is intended to convey ’ ’ 

Mr. Moller hesitated an instant. Then: “I 
think I can explain it better, sir, later on,” he 
replied. 

Mr. Fernald bowed, again swept the offenders 
with a glance of withering contempt and took his 
departure. Mr. Moller looked troubledly after 
him before he turned to Westcott and said 


THE JOKE ON MR. MOLLER 149 


kindly: “Now, Westcott, we will go on, if you 
please.” 

What passed between principal and instructor 
later that day was not known, but the result of the 
interview appeared the next morning when Mr. 
Fernald announced in chapel that because they 
had seen fit to publicly insult a member of the 
faculty he considered it only just to publicly in¬ 
form the following students that they were placed 
on probation until further notice. Then followed 
the names of Hall, Westcott, Byrd, Draper and 
five others. Mr. Fernald added that but for the 
intercession of the faculty member whom they had 
so vilely affronted the punishment would have 
been far heavier. 

Nine very depressed youths took their departure 
from chapel that morning. To Tom Hall, since 
the edict meant that he could not play any more 
football that season, unless, which was scarcely 
probable, faculty relented within a week or so, the 
blow was far heavier than to any of the others. 
Being on probation was never a state to be sought 
for, but when one was in his last year at school 
and had looked forward to ending his football 
career in a blaze of glory, probation was just 
about as bad as being expelled. In fact, for a day 
or two Tom almost wished that Mr. Fernald had 


150 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


selected the latter punishment. What made things 
harder to bear was the attitude of coaches and 
players and the school at large. After the first 
shock of surprise and dismay, they had agreed 
with remarkable unanimity that Tom had not only 
played the fool, but had proved himself a traitor, 
and they didn’t fail to let Tom know their verdict. 
For several days he was as nearly ostracised as it 
was possible to be, and those days were very un¬ 
happy ones for him. 

Of course Tom was not utterly deserted. Steve 
Edwards stood by him firmly, fought public opin¬ 
ion, narrowly escaped a pitched battle with the 
president of the Sixth Form, worried Coach 
Robey to death with his demands that that gentle¬ 
man intercede for Tom at the office and tried his 
best all the time to keep Tom’s spirits up. Clint 
and Don and Tim and a few others remained 
steadfast, as did Amy, who, blaming himself bit¬ 
terly for Tom’s fix, had done everything he could 
do to atone. Following that edict in chapel, Amy 
had sought audience with Mr. Fernald and begged 
clemency for the others. 

1 ‘You see, sir,” Amy had pleaded earnestly, “I 
was the one who started it. The others would 
never have gone into it if I hadn’t just simply 
made them. Why-” 


THE JOKE ON MR. MOLLER 151 


Mr. Fernald smiled faintly. “You’re trying to 
convince me, Byrd, that boys like Draper and Hall 
and Stearns and Westcott are so weak-willed that 
they allowed you to drag them into this thing 
against their better judgment and inclinations V ’ 
“Yes, sir! At least—perhaps not exactly that, 
Mr. Fernald, but I—I nagged them and dared 
them, you see, sir, and they didn’t like to be dared 
and they just did it to shut me up. ’ ’ 

“It’s decent of you, Byrd, to try t: assume all 
the blame, but your story doesn’t carry convic¬ 
tion. Even if it did, I should be sorely tempted to 
let the verdict stand, for I should consider boys 
who were so easily dragged into mischief badly in 
need of discipline. I do wish you’d tell me one 
thing, Byrd. How could a fellow, a manly, decent 
fellow like you, think up such a caddish trick? 
Wounding another man’s feelings, Byrd, isn’t 
really funny, if you stop to consider it. ’ ’ 

“I didn’t mean to hurt Mr. Moller’s feelings, 
sir,” replied Amy earnestly. “We—I thought it 
would just be a—a sort of a good joke to dress like 
him, sir, and—and get a laugh from the class. 
I’m sorry. I guess it was a pretty rotten thing to 
do, sir. Only I didn’t think about it that way.” 

“I believe that. Since you’ve been here, Byrd, 
you’ve been into more or less mischief, but I’ve 


152 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


never known yon to be gnilty before of anything 
in such utterly bad taste. Unfortunately, how¬ 
ever, I can’t excuse you because you didn’t think. 
You should have thought.” 

“Yes, sir,” agreed Amy eagerly, “and I don’t 
expect to be excused, sir. I only thought that 
maybe you’d let up on the others if you knew how 
it all happened. I thought maybe it would do just 
as well if you expelled me, sir, and let the other 
fellows off easy. Tom Hall-” 

“I see. It’s Hall who’s worrying you, is it? 
You’re afraid Hall’s absence from the team may 
result disastrously? Possibly it will. If it does 
I shall be sorry, but Hall will have to take his 
medicine just like the rest of you. Perhaps this 
will teach you all to think a little before you act. 
No, Byrd, I shall have to refuse your offer. Ex¬ 
pelling you would not be disciplining the rest, nor 
would it be an equitable division of punishment. 
The verdict must stand, my boy.” 

Amy went sorrowfully forth and announced the 
result to Clint. “I think he might have done what 
I wanted,” he complained a trifle resentfully. 

“You’re an utter ass,” said Clint with unflat¬ 
tering conviction. “What good would it do you 
to get fired in your last year?” 

“None, but if he’d have let the others off-” 


THE JOKE ON MR. MOLLER 153 


“Do you suppose that the others would have 
agreed to any such bargain? They’re not kids, 
even if you try to make them out so. They went 
into the thing with their eyes open and are just as 
much to blame as you are. They wouldn’t let you 
be the goat, you idiot!” 

‘ 4 They needn’t have known anything about it, 
Clint. Oh, well, I suppose there’s no use fussing. 
I don’t care about the others. It’s Tom I’m sorry 
for. And the team, too. Pryme can’t fill Tom’s 
shoes, and we’ll get everlastingly walloped, and 
it’ll be my fault, and-” 

“Piffle! Tom’s a good player, one of the best, 
but he isn’t the whole team. Pryme will play the 
position nearly as well. I’m sorry for Tom, too, 
but he’s the one who will have to do the worrying, 
I guess. Now you buck up and quit looking like a 
kicked cur.” 

“If only the fellows didn’t have it in for him 
the way they have, ’ ’ mourned Amy. 41 Everyone’s 
down on him and he knows it and he’s worried to 
death about it. They’re a lot of rotters! After 
the way Tom’s worked on that team ever since he 
got on it! Why, he’s done enough for the school 
if he never played another lick at anything! And 
I’ll tell you another thing. Someone’s going to 
get licked if I hear any more of this knocking! ’ ’ 


154 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


4 4 You ’ll have to lick most of the school then/’ 
replied Clint calmly. 4 ‘Try not to be a bigger 
chump than nature made you, Amy. You can’t 
blame the fellows for being a bit sore at Tom. I 
am myself. Only I realise that he didn’t mean to 
get into trouble with the office, and the rest of them 
don’t, I reckon. It’ll all blow over in a few days. 
Cheer up. A month from now you won’t care a 
whoop.” 

“If we’re beaten by Claflin I’ll get out of 
school,” answered Amy dolefully. 

“All right, son, but don’t begin to pack your 
trunk yet. We won’t be.” 


CHAPTER Xm 


SOUTHBY YIELDS 

The game with Southby Academy that week was 
played away from home. As a general thing 
Southby was not a formidable opponent and last 
year’s contest had resulted in a 17 to 3 win for 
Brimfield. But this Fall Southby had been piling 
up larger scores against her opponents and her 
stock had risen. Consequently Brimfield, being de¬ 
prived of Tom Hall’s services at right guard and 
of Rollins’s at full-back, journeyed otf that morn¬ 
ing more than a little doubtful of the result of the 
coming conflict. Most of the school went along, 
since Southby was easily reached by trolley and 
at a small outlay for fares, and Brimfield was 
pretty well deserted by one o’clock. Out of some 
one hundred and eighty students a scant forty 
remained behind, and of that two-score we can 
guess who nine were! 

The game started with Edwards at left end for 
Brimfield, Thayer at left tackle, Gilbert at left 
guard, Peters at centre, Pryme at right guard, 
Sturges at right tackle, Holt at right end, Carmine 
155 


156 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


at quarter, St. Clair at left half, Otis at right half 
and Martin at full-back. Later on, toward the 
end of the second quarter, Thursby went in at 
centre, and in the fourth period several substitutes 
had their chances, amongst them Harry Walton. 

Walton had begun to realise that he was play¬ 
ing a losing game. Since Pryme had been shifted 
back to the right side of the line Don Gilbert had 
come more than ever to the fore and Harry had 
spent a deal more time with the substitute squad 
in practice and on the bench during scrimmage 
than he approved of. Harry had a very special 
reason for wanting to win that left guard position 
and to play in it during the Claflin game, and this 
afternoon, sitting on the side line with a dozen 
other blanketed substitutes and enviously watch¬ 
ing Don in the coveted place, his brain evolved a 
plan that promised so well that by the time the 
second period had started he was looking almost 
cheerful. And that is saying a good deal, since 
Harry Walton’s countenance very seldom ex¬ 
pressed cheer. 

Southby showed her mettle within five minutes 
of the kick-off, when, getting the ball on a fumble 
on her forty-five yard line, she tore off thirty-three 
yards on a complicated double-pass play and then 
ripped another down from the astonished adver- 


SOUTHBY YIELDS 


157 


sary. On the Maroon-and-Grey’s nine yards, how¬ 
ever, her advance was halted, and after two downs 
had resulted in a loss, she sent her kicker hack and 
placed a neat drop over the cross-bars, scoring 
three points before the stop-watch had ticked oft 
six minutes of playing time. 

That score was apparently just what Brimfield 
needed to bring her to her senses, for the rest of 
the period was marked by brilliant defensive work 
on her part, followed toward the end of the twelve 
minutes by some equally good attacks. When the 
teams changed places Brimfield had the pigskin 
on Southby’s thirty-eight yards with four to go 
on third down. A forward pass, Carmine to St. 
Clair, produced three of the required four and 
Martin slipped through between left guard and 
tackle for the rest. After that ten well-selected 
plays took the ball to the sixteen yards. But there 
Southby rallied, and Steve Edwards, dropping 
back as if to kick, tore off five more around the 
left end. A touchdown seemed imminent now, 
and the hundred or so Brimfield rooters shouted 
and cheered madly enough. But two plunges at 
the right of the Southby line were stopped for 
scant gain and, with Martin back, a forward pass 
to Holt missed that youth and fell plump into the 
hands of a Southby end, and it was Southby’s ball 


158 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


on her eight yards when the dust of battle had 
cleared away. 

That was Brimfield’s last chance to score in 
that half and when the whistle sounded Southby 
had the pigskin once more in her adversary’s ter¬ 
ritory. 

So far the teams had proved evenly matched in 
all departments, with a possible slight superiority 
in punting belonging to the visitors. St. Clair 
and Martin divided the punting between them and 
together they managed to outmatch the efforts of 
the Southby kicker. In the line both teams were 
excellent on defence, and both showed similar 
weakness in attack. In Tom Hall’s place Pryme 
had worked hard and had, on the whole, done all 
that was expected of him. But he wasn’t Tom 
Hall, and no amount of coaching would make him 
Tom’s equal that Fall. Pryme lacked two factors: 
weight and, more especially, experience. Southby 
had made some good gains through him in the 
first half and would have made more had not 
Peters and Sturges helped him valiantly. As to 
the backfields,a disinterested spectator would have 
liked the Brimfield players a bit the better, less 
perhaps for what they actually accomplished that 
day than for what they promised. Even with Rol¬ 
lins out, the Maroon-and-Grey backs showed a fine 


SOUTHBY YIELDS 


159 


and consistent solidarity that was lacking in the 
opponents. Coach Robey was a believer in team- 
play as opposed to the exploitation of stars, while 
Southby, with a remarkable half-back in the per¬ 
son of a blonde-haired youth named Elliston, had 
built her backfield about one man. As a conse¬ 
quence, when Elliston was smothered, as was fre¬ 
quently the case, since Southby’s opponents natu¬ 
rally played for him all the time, the play was 
stopped. Today Captain Edwards had displayed 
an almost uncanny ability to “get” Elliston when 
the play was in his direction, and so far the 
blonde-haired star had failed to distinguish him¬ 
self save in that one thirty-three-yard gambol at 
the beginning of the contest. What might happen 
later was problematical, but so far Brimfield had 
solved Elliston fairly well. 

A guard seldom has an opportunity to pose in 
the limelight, and so you are not to hear that Don 
pulled off any brilliant feats that afternoon. What 
he did do was to very thoroughly vindicate Mr. 
Robey’s selection of him for Gafferty’s position 
by giving an excellent impersonation of a concrete 
block on defence and by doing rather better than 
he had ever done before when his side had the ball. 
Don had actually speeded up considerably, much 
as Tim had assured him he could, and while he was 


160 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


still by no means the snappiest man in the line, nor 
was ever likely to be, he was seldom far behind 
his fellows. For that matter the whole line of for¬ 
wards was still much slower than; Mr. Robey 
wanted them at that time of year, and Don showed 
up not badly in comparison. After all, what is 
needed in a guard is, first and foremost, fighting 
spirit, and Don had that. If he was a bit slower to 
sense a play, a little later in getting into it, at 
least when he did start he started hard and tackled 
hard and always played it safe. In the old days 
when a guard had only his small territory between 
centre and tackle to cover, Don would have been 
an ideal player for the position, but now, when a 
guard’s duties are to free-lance, so to speak, from 
one end of the line to the other and to get into 
the play no matter where it comes, Don’s qualifica¬ 
tions were more limited. A guard in these amaz¬ 
ing times is “soldier and sailor too,” and Don, 
who liked to deal with one idea at a time, found it 
a bit confusing to have to grapple with a half- 
dozen ! 

Brimfield returned to the battle at the beginning 
of the second half highly resolved to take no more 
fooling from her opponent. Fortune ordered it 
that the south goal should fall to her portion and 
that a faint but dependable breeze should spring 


SOUTHBY YIELDS 


161 


up between the halves. That breeze changed 
Coach Robey’s plans, and the team went on with 
instructions to kick its way to within scoring dis¬ 
tance and then batter through the line at any cost. 
And so the spectators were treated to a very 
pretty punting exhibition by both teams, for, 
wisely or unwisely, Southby accepted the chal¬ 
lenge and punted almost as often as her adversary. 
That third period supplied many thrills but no 
scoring, for although Brimfield did manage to get 
the ball on Southby’s twenty-five-yard line when a 
back fumbled, the advantage ended there. Two 
rushes failed, a forward pass grounded and when 
St. Clair tried to skirt his own left end he was 
pulled down just short of his distance and Southby 
soon punted out of danger. 

When time was called both teams made several 
substitutions. Don yielded his place to Harry 
Walton, Crewe went in at right tackle and McPhee 
took Carmine’s position at quarter. With the 
advantage of the wind no longer hers, Brimfield 
abandoned the kicking game and used her back- 
field for all it was worth. From the middle of the 
field to Southby’s thirty yards she went without 
much difficulty, St. Clair, Martin and Tim Otis 
carrying the ball for short but consistent gains. 
But at the thirty Southby braced and captured the 


162 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


pigskin on downs by a matter of inches. It was 
then that Elliston repeated. Following two at¬ 
tempts at Pryme ’s position, which yielded a scan,t 
four yards, Elliston got away around Steve Ed¬ 
wards’s end and, with some good interference for 
the first ten or twelve yards, passed the whole 
field except McPhee and was only brought down 
by that player after he had run to Brimfield’s 
twenty-six yards. 

Southby’s adherents cheered wildly and de¬ 
manded a touchdown, and it looked for awhile as 
though their team was to give them what they 
asked for. Southby twice poked a back through 
the centre of the maroon-and-grey line and then 
tore off ten yards around Clint Thayer, Steve 
Edwards being put wholly out of the play. Then, 
however, Brimfield dug her cleats and held the 
enemy, giving a very heartening exhibition of 
stubborn defence, and again Southby decided that 
half a loaf was better than none and tried a field- 
goal. She ought never to have got it, for the left 
side of her line was torn to ribbons by the desper¬ 
ate defenders. But she did, nevertheless, the ball 
in some miraculous manner slipping through the 
upstretched hands and leaping bodies and just top¬ 
ping the bar. 

Those three added points seemed to spell defeat 


SOUTHBY YIELDS 


163 


for Brimfield, and many of lier supporters in the 
stand conceded the victory to Southby then and 
there. But the team refused to view the matter 
in that light and came back fighting hard. With 
only some seven minutes of the twelve left, Mc- 
Phee opened the line when Southby had finally 
been forced to punt from her twelve yards and St. 
Clair had caught on his forty-five, and started a 
series of direct-pass plays that, coming as they did 
on the heels of an afternoon of close-formation 
plays, confused the enemy until the ball had been 
planted near her thirty-five yards. Brimfield 
fought desperately then, closing her line again and 
sending Edwards off on an end-around run that 
took the pigskin eight’ yards nearer the last white 
mark. 

It was then that St. Clair really showed what 
was in him. Four times he took the ball and four 
times he plunged, squirming, fighting, through 
the Southby centre and, with the Brimfield shouts 
cheering him on, put the leather down at last on 
Southby *s eighteen. Otis got three off left tackle 
and McPhee tried the same end for no gain. Mar¬ 
tin went back and, faking a kick, threw forward to 
Edwards, who romped to the nine yards before he 
was smothered. It was fourth down then, with 
less than a yard to go, and St. Clair was called on. 


164 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


A delayed-pass did the business and Southby was 
digging her toes into her seven yards. Martin 
slid off right tackle for two, bringing the ball 
nearly in front of goal, and the defenders again 
fell back. 

Carmine was sent in again for McPhee and 
Lawton took Pryme’s place. Carmine evidently 
brought instructions, for Captain Edwards fell 
back to kicking position after the conference, and 
the ball was passed to him. But with only five to 
go and three downs to do it in a drop-kick was not 
likely, especially as three points would still leave 
Brimfield beaten, and so Southby disregarded the 
bluff. But if a kick was out of the question a for¬ 
ward pass was not, and it was a forward pass that 
Southby set herself for. And so, with her ends 
drawn out and her backs spread, the touchdown 
came easily. For Steve faked a throw to the right, 
where Holt apparently waited, and then dashed 
straight ahead, the ball against his ribs, his head 
down and his feet flying, struck the hastily-formed 
massing of Southby’s centre like a battering ram 
and literally tore his way through until, when he 
was at last pulled down, he was five yards over 
the line! 

Since Brimfield needed that goal badly, Rollins, 
in spite of bandages, was sent in for Martin, and, 


SOUTHBY YIELDS 


165 


when Carmine had canted the ball to his liking, 
very calmly put it squarely between the uprights 
above the bar. 

The remaining minute and a half of play 
brought no results and Brimfield trotted off victor 
by the narrow margin of one point, while her ad¬ 
herents flowed across the field cheering and flaunt¬ 
ing their banners in triumph. 


CHAPTER XIV 


WALTON WRITES A NOTE 

The Southby game was played on the sixth of 
November, a fortnight before the final contest with 
Claflin School, and practically marked the end of 
the preparatory season. Brimfield would meet 
her blue-legged rival with what plays she had 
already learned and the time for instruction was 
passed. The remaining two weeks, which held but 
ten playing days, would be devoted to perfecting 
plays already known, to polishing off the rough 
angles of attack and defence and to learning a 
new set of signals as a matter of precaution. 
Those ten days were expected to work a big im¬ 
provement in the team. Whether they would or 
not remained to be seen. 

On the whole, Brimfield had passed through a 
successful season. She had played seven games, 
of which she had lost one, won five and tied one. 
Next week’s adversary, Chambers, would in all 
likelihood supply a sixth victory, in which case 
the Maroon-and-Grey would face Claflin with a 
nearly clean slate. Claflin, on her part, had hung 
166 


WALTON WRITES A NOTE 


167 


up a rather peculiar record that Fall. She had 
played one more game than Brimfield, had won 
four, lost one and tied three. She had started out 
strongly, had had a slump in mid-season and was 
now, from all evidence at hand, recovering finely. 
On comparative scores there was little to choose 
between the rivals. If any perceptible advantage 
belonged to Brimfield it was only because she had 
maintained a steadier pace. 

There was a lay-off for most of the first-string 
players on Monday, a fact which gave Harry Wal¬ 
ton a chance to conduct himself very capably at 
left guard during the four ten-minute periods of 
scrimmage with the second. Don didn’t go near 
the field that afternoon and so was saved any of 
the uneasiness which the sight of Walton’s per¬ 
formance might have caused him. Rollins got back 
for a short workout and showed few signs of his 
injury. The second team, profiting by some scout¬ 
ing done by Coach Boutelle and Joe Gafferty on 
Saturday, tried out the Claflin formation and such 
Claflin plays as had been fathomed against the 
first team and made some good gains thereby until 
the second-string players solved them. On Tues¬ 
day Harry Walton disgruntedly found himself 
again relegated to the bench during most of the 
practice game and saw Don open holes in the sec- 


168 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


ond team’s line in a style that more than once 
brought commendation from Coach Robey. Wal¬ 
ton glowered from the bench until Cotter dis¬ 
gustedly asked if he felt sick. Whereupon Walton 
grinned and Cotter, with a sigh, begged him to 
scowl again! 

The first team presented its full strength that 
afternoon, and Mr. Boutelle’s Claflin plays made 
little headway. With Rollins back in place, the 
first team scored almost at will during three 
periods, and even after an entirely new backfield 
was put in it continued to smash the second up 
very effectually. Mr. Boutelle scolded and raved 
and threatened, but all to scant purpose. The first 
got its plays off very smoothly, played low and 
hard and, for once, played together. The final 
score that day was the biggest ever piled up in a 
practice contest, 30 to 3. Had Mr. Robey allowed 
Rollins to try goals from touchdowns it would 
have been several points larger. 

Tom Hall had so far carefully avoided the field, 
but today he appeared there and sat in the stand 
with Roy Draper and tried his best to be cheerful. 
But his best wasn’t very good. Already the feel¬ 
ing against him had largely subsided, and the 
school, realising, perhaps, that Tom’s loss to the 
team did not necessarily spell defeat for it, was 


WALTON WRITES A NOTE 


169 


inclined to be sorry for him. But Tom didn’t 
realise that, since he still kept to himself and was 
suspicious of advances. He hadn’t quarrelled with 
the school’s verdict, but it had hurt him and, as he 
didn’t like being hurt any more than most of us, 
he avoided the chance of it. In those days he stuck 
pretty close to his room, partly because the office 
required it and partly because he had no heart for 
mingling with his fellows. Roy Draper had to 
plead long and earnestly that afternoon to get him 
to the gridiron. As badly as he felt about losing 
his place on the team, however, Tom didn’t be¬ 
grudge Pryme his good fortune, and he was hon¬ 
estly pleased to see that the latter, in spite of his 
deficiencies, would doubtless fill the right guard 
position very capably in the Claflin game. He 
studied Pryme’s work attentively that afternoon, 
criticised it and praised it and showed no trace of 
animosity. 

“He will do all right,” he confided to Roy. 
“Crewe will help him,a lot, and so will Thursby. 
If he could use his hands a bit better he’d be fine. 
He holds himself nicely, doesn’t he? On his toes 
all the time. I hate to see a lineman play flat- 
footed. That’s one trouble with Don Gilbert. 
Don’s doing a heap better than he did last year, 
though. I guess he’s every bit as good as Joe 


170 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


Gafferty. He’s a regular whale on defence, isn’t 
he? He’s a queer chap, Don, but a mighty nice 
one. ’ ’ 

“Don,” replied Roy in his somewhat didactic 
manner, “is the sort of fellow I’d pick out to be 
cast away on a desert island with. He isn’t so 
scintillant, you know, but he’d wear forever.” 

“That’s him to a T.” Tom chuckled. “They 
tell me Harry Walton is as mad as a hatter be¬ 
cause Don butted in and grabbed that position 
away from him. Can’t say I altogether blame 
him, either. That is, there’s no use getting mad 
about it, but it is tough luck. Harry isn’t a half- 
bad guard, either. ’ ’ 

“If he can play good football,” answered Roy, 
“I’m glad to know it. I’ve always wondered what 
Walton was for.” 

Tom laughed. “Oh, he isn’t so bad, I guess. 
His manner’s against him. ’ ’ 

“I’ve noticed it,” said Roy drily. “Also his 
looks and his remarks and a number of other 
things. Larry Jones says he comes from the best 
sort of family.” 

“A fellow’s family doesn’t prove anything, I 
guess.” 

“Evidently not. There’s the whistle. Let’s go 
back.” Presently Roy added, as they headed for 


WALTON WRITES A NOTE 171 

Torrence: “I can quite understand why Walton’s 
family sent him to school.” 

“Why they sent him to school?” repeated Tom 
questioningly. 

“Yes, it was to get rid of him.” 

“You’ve certainly got your little hammer with 
you,” said Tom, with a smile. “What’s Harry 
done to you?” 

“Not a thing. I wouldn’t advise him to, either. 
I just don’t like him, Tom. Can’t stand being in 
the same room with him. Well, see you later, old 
chap. And, say, think over what I said about— 
you know.” 

“Oh, that’s all right,” replied Tom, with a 
shrug of his broad shoulders. “Fellows can think 
what they like about me. I don’t blame them. 
But you can’t expect me to like it!” 

“I know, Tom, but they don’t feel that way 
now. It was just for a day or two. I’ve heard a 
lot of fellows say lately that it’s nonsense blam¬ 
ing you, Tom. So come out of your shell, like a 
sensible chap, and show that you don’t feel any— 
any ill-will.” 

“Well, I don’t, I suppose. As for coming out 
of my shell, I’ll be crawling out pretty soon. Don’t 
bother about me, Roy. I’m feeling fine. So 
long.” 


172 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


Perhaps what Tom really meant was that he was 
feeling a whole lot better than he had a few days 
before, for he certainly had not become quite 
reconciled to the loss of his positon with the team. 
He was getting used to the idea, but he wasn’t 
happy over it. When he squarely faced the fact 
that when Claflin came trotting onto the field on 
the twentieth he would be sitting in the grand 
stand instead of being out there in togs, his heart 
sank miserably and he hardly knew whether he 
wanted to kick something or get off in a corner 
and cry. At such moments the question of 
whether his school fellows liked him or detested 
him bothered little. If he could only play against 
Claflin, he assured himself, the school might hate 
him to its heart’s content! 

Going on to Billings and his room, he considered 
what Roy had told him of the altered sentiment 
toward him, but somehow he didn’t seem to care 
so much today. Watching practice had brought 
back the smart, and being liked or disliked seemed 
a little thing beside the bigger trouble. Still, he 
thought, if Roy was right perhaps he had better 
meet fellows half-way. There was no use in being 
a grouch. As a starter and in order to test the 
accuracy of Roy’s statement, he decided that he 
would drop in on Carl Bennett, who roomed in 


WALTON WRITES A NOTE 


173 


Number 3. Bennett was a chap he rather re¬ 
spected and, while they had never been very close 
friends, Tom had seen a good deal of the other 
during the Fall. But Bennett was not in and Tom 
was making his way back to the stairs when the 
door of Number 6 opened and Harry Walton came 
out. Perhaps it was Roy’s dressing-down of that 
youth that prompted Tom to be more decent to 
him than usual. At all events, Tom stopped and 
hailed him and they conversed together on their 
way up the stairs. It wasn’t until later that Tom, 
recalling Harry’s grudge against Hon, wondered 
what had taken him to the latter’s room. Then 
he concluded that Harry had probably been call¬ 
ing on Tim, and thought no more of it. Just now 
he asked Harry how he was getting on with the 
team and was a little puzzled when Harry replied: 
“All right, I guess. Of course, Gilbert’s got the 
call right now, but I’m going to beat him out be¬ 
fore the big game. Hid you see practice today!” 

“Yes. You fellows put up a great game, 
Harry. ’ ’ 

“I didn’t get into it for more than ten minutes. 
Robey’s playing Hon Gilbert for all he knows.” 
Harry laughed disagreeably. “Robey’s a bit of a 
fox. ’ ’ 

“How’s that!” Tom inquired. 


174 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“Oh, he’s sort of keeping me guessing, you see. 
Thinks Ill get worried and dig harder.” 

“Huh. I see. You seem mighty certain of that 
place, Harry.’ 9 

“Sure, I’m certain. You just wait and see, old 
top.” Harry nodded and entered his room across 
the hall, leaving Tom a trifle more sympathetic 
toward Roy’s estimation of him. Walton cer¬ 
tainly did have a disagreeable manner, he re¬ 
flected. 

As a matter of fact, Harry hadn’t been calling 
on anyone in Number 6 for the simple reason that 
he had found no one at home. Moreover, he had 
expected to find no one, for he had left Tim at the 
gymnasium and seen Don and Harry Westcott sit¬ 
ting in the window of the latter’s room in Tor¬ 
rence as he passed. What he had done was leave 
a hastily scrawled note for Don on the table in 
there, a note which Don discovered an hour later 
and which at once puzzled and disturbed him. 

“Come up and see me after supper will you,” 
the note read, with a superb disdain of punctua¬ 
tion, “I want to see you Important. H. Wal¬ 
ton.” 

“What’s he want to see you about?” asked Tim 
when Don tossed the note to him to read. 

“I don’t know.” Don frowned thoughtfully. 


WALTON WRITES A NOTE 175 

“I hope he isn’t going to make trouble about that 
old business.” 

1 1 What old business?” asked Tim carelessly, 
more interested in a set of bruised knuckles than 
anything else just then. 

“Why, you know Harry saw us climbing in the 
window that night.” 

“Saw us climb—Well, what of it? That was 
years ago. Why should he want to make trouble 
about that? And how could he do it? I’d like to 
see him start anything with me.” 

“Oh, well, I just happened to think of that.” 

“More likely he’s going to ask you to break a 
leg or something so he can get your place,” 
chuckled Tim. “Don’t you do it, Don, if he does. 
It doesn’t pay to be too obliging. Ready for 
eats?” 

“In a minute.” Don dropped the note and be¬ 
gan his toilet, but he didn’t speak again until they 
were on their way down the stairs. Then: “If 
it should be that,” he remarked, “I wouldn’t 
know whether to punch his head or laugh at 
him.” 

“Don’t take any chances,” advised Tim grimly. 
“Punch his head. Better still, bring the glad 
tidings to me and let me do it. Why, if that idiot 
threatened to open his face about us I’d give him 


176 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


such a walloping that his own folks wouldn’t 
recognise the remnants! Gee, but I’m hungry to¬ 
night! Toddle along faster and let’s get there 
before Rollins and Holt and the rest swipe all the 
grub.” 


CHAPTER XV 


A PROPOSITION 

Don sought Harry Walton’s room soon after sup¬ 
per was over and found neither Harry nor his 
room-mate, Jim Rose, at home. He lighted the 
droplight, found a magazine several months old 
and sat down to wait. He had, however, scarcely 
got into a story before Harry appeared. 

11 Hello, ’’ greeted the latter. ‘ ‘ Sorry I was late. 
Had to stop at the library for a book.” In proof 
of it he tossed a volume to the table. “I asked 
you to come up here, Gilbert, because I have a 
proposition to make and I thought you wouldn’t 
want anyone around.” Harry seated himself, 
took one knee into his clasped hands and smiled 
at the visitor. It was a peculiarly unattractive 
smile, Don decided. 

“Proposition?” Don frowned perplexedly. 
“What sort of a proposition, Walton?” 

“Well, I’ll tell you. It’s like this, Gilbert. You 
see, old man, you and I are fighting like the mis¬ 
chief for the left guard position and so far it’s 
about nip-and-tuck, isn’t it?” 

177 


178 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


Don viewed the speaker with some surprise. 
“Is it?” he asked. “I thought I had rather the 
best of it, Walton.” 

Harry smiled and shrugged. “That’s only 
Robey’s foxiness. I’m not saying he might not 
pick you for the place in the end, of course, but 
I stand just as good a show. Robey doesn’t like 
to show his hand. He likes to keep you guessing. 
I’m willing to bet that if nothing happened he’d 
drop you next week and stick me in there. Of 
course you might get in for awhile in the Claflin 
game, if I got hurt, but I wouldn’t advise you to 
bank much on that because I’m rather lucky about 
not getting hurt. Honestly, Gilbert, I don’t really 
think you’ve got much of a chance of final selec¬ 
tion.” 

Don observed his host’s countenance with some 
bewilderment. “Well,” he said at last, “that may 
be so or not. What is it you want me to do ? ” 

“I’ll tell you.” Harry tried hard to look in¬ 
genuous, but only succeeded in grinning like a cat¬ 
fish. “It’s this way. My folks are coming up for 
the Claflin game; father and mother and kid 
brother, you know. Well, naturally, I’d like to 
have them see me play. They think I’m going to, 
of course, because I’ve mentioned it once or twice 
in my letters. I’d feel pretty cheap if they came 


A PROPOSITION 


179 


up here and watched me sitting on the bench all 
through the game. See what I mean, old man?” 

Don nodded and waited. 

4 ‘Well, so I thought that as your chance is 
pretty slim anyway maybe you wouldn’t mind 
dropping out. I wouldn’t ask you to if I really 
thought you had much chance, you know, Gil¬ 
bert.” 

“Oh! That’s it? Well, I’m sorry if you’re 
folks are going to be disappointed, Walton, but I 
don’t feel quite like playing the goat on that ac¬ 
count. You might just write them and sort of 
prepare them for the shock, mightn’t you? Tell 
them there’s a bare chance that you won’t get into 
the fracas, you know. I would. It would soften 
the blow for them, Walton.” 

Walton scowled. “Don’t be funny,” he said 
shortly. “I’ve given you the chance to drop out 
gracefully, Gilbert, and you’re a fool not to 
take it.” 

“But why should I drop out? Don’t you sup¬ 
pose I want to play in the Claflin game just as 
much as you do ? ” 

“Perhaps you do, but you won’t play in it any 
way you figure it. If you don’t quit willingly 
you’ll quit the other way. I’m giving you a fair 
chance^, that’s all. You’ve only got to make be- 


180 


LEFT GUAED GILBEET 


lieve you’re sick or play sort of rottenly a couple 
of times. That will do the trick for you and there 
won’t be any other trouble.” 

“Say, what are you hinting at?” demanded Don 
quietly. “What have you got up your sleeve?” 

“Plenty, Gilbert. I’ve got enough up my sleeve 
to get you fired from school.” 

There was a moment of silence. Then Don 
nodded thoughtfully. “So that’s it, is it?” he 
murmured. 

11 That’s it, old man. ’ ’ Harry grinned. ‘ ‘ Think 
it over now. ’ ’ 

“What do you think you’ve got on me?” asked 
Don. 

“I don’t think. I know that you and three other 
fellows helped put out that fire that night and that 
you didn’t get back to hall until long after ten- 
thirty.” Harry dropped his knee, thrust his 
hands into his pockets, leaned back in his chair 
and viewed Don triumphantly. “I don’t want to 
go to faculty with it, Gilbert, although it’s really 
my duty and I certainly shall if you force me.” 

“Hm,” mused Don. “But wouldn’t faculty 
wonder why you’d been so long about it?” 

“Probably. I’d have to tell the truth and-” 

“I guess that would hurt,” interpolated the 
other drily. 


A PROPOSITION 


181 


“And explain that I’d tried to shield you fel¬ 
lows, hut that my conscience had finally pre¬ 
vailed.” And Harry grinned broadly. “Josh 
wouldn’t like it, but he wouldn’t do anything to 
me. What he’d do to you, though, would be a 
plenty, Gilbert. It would be expulsion, and you 
know that as well as I do.” 

“ Yes, I do. ” Don dropped his gaze to his hands 
and was silent a moment. Then: “Of course 
you’ve thought of what it would mean to you, Wal¬ 
ton? I wouldn’t be likely to keep you out of it, 
you know.” 

Harry shrugged. “Fellows might talk some, 
but I’d only be doing my duty. As long as my 
conscience was clear-” 

“You’re a dirty pup, Walton,” said Don, “and 
if I wasn’t afraid of getting the mange I’d give 
you the beating you deserve.” 

“Calling names won’t get you anything, Gil¬ 
bert. I’m not afraid of anything you could do to 
me, anyway. I may be a pup, but I’m where 
I can make you sit up and beg, and I’m going 
to do it.” 

“You think you are,” said Don contemptuously. 
“Let me tell you now that I’d rather be fired a 
dozen times than make any bargains with a com¬ 
mon skunk like you! ’ ’ 


182 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“That means yon want me to go ahead and tell 
Josh, does it!” 

“It means that yon can do anything yon want 
to, Walton.’’ Don stood np. “But if yon do go 
to faculty with the story you’ll get the worst lick¬ 
ing yon ever had or heard of, and fellows will 
make it so unpleasant here for you that you won’t 
stay much longer than I do. Now you think it 
over! ’ ’ 

“What fellows say or think won’t hurt me a 
mite, thank you, and I’m not afraid of you or any 
of your friends, Gilbert. Wait a minute now. 
We’re not through yet.” 

“I am, thanks,” replied Don, moving toward 
the door. 

“Oh, no you’re not. You may feel heroic and 
all that and too mad to give in just now, but you’re 
not considering what it will mean if you make me 
squeal to faculty. Why, we wouldn’t have a ghost 
of a show with Claflin! ’ ’ 

“I thought you considered yourself quite 
as good a guard as me, Walton,” answered 
Don. 

“I do, old man. But I don’t think I’m able to 
take the places of all the other fellows who would 
be missing from the team.” 

Don turned, with his hand on the door-knob, and 


A PROPOSITION 183 

stared startledly. “What do yon mean by that?” 
he asked. 

“I thought that would fetch you,” chuckled 
Harry. “I mean that you’re not the only one who 
would quit the dear old school, Gilbert. You 
haven’t forgotten, I suppose, that there were three 
other fellows mixed up in the business?” 

“No, but faculty would have to know more than 
I’d tell them before they’d find out who the others 
were. ’ ’ 

“Oh, you wouldn’t have to tell them, old man.” 

“Meaning you would? You don’t know, Wal¬ 
ton. ’ ’ 

“ Don’t I, though ? You bet I do! I know every 
last one of them! ’ ’ 

“You told me-” 

“Oh, I let you think I didn’t, Gilbert. No use 
telling everything you know.” 

“I don’t believe it!” But, in spite of the state¬ 
ment, Don did believe it and was trying to realise 
what it meant. 

“Don’t be a fool! Why wouldn’t I know? If I 
could see you why couldn’t I see Clint Thayer and 
Tim Otis and Tom Hall? You were all as plain as 
daylight. Of course, Tom’s out of it, anyway, but 
I guess losing a left tackle and a right half-back a 
week before the game would put rather a dent in 



184 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


our chances, what! And that’s just what will 
happen if you make me go to Josh with the 
story!” 

“ You wouldn’t!” challenged Don, but there was 
scant conviction in his tone. Harry shrugged his 
shoulders. 

“Oh, I’d rather not. I don’t want to play on a 
losing team, and that’s what I’d be doing, but you 
see I’ve sort of set my heart on playing right 
guard a week from Saturday, Gilbert, and I hate 
to be disappointed. Hate to disappoint my folks, 
too.” 

‘ ‘ They must be proud of you! ’ ’ 

“They are, take it from me.” Harry’s smile 
vanished and he looked ugly as he went on. 
“Don’t be a fool, Gilbert! You’d do the same 
thing yourself if you had the chance. You’re 
playing the hypocrite, and you know it. I’ve got 
you dead to rights and I mean to make the most 
of it. If you don’t get off the team inside of two 
days I’ll go to Josh and tell him everything I 
know. It isn’t pretty, maybe, but it’s playing 
your hand for what there is in it, and that’s my 
way! Now you sit down again and just think it 
all over, Gilbert. Take all the time you want. 
And remember this, too. If I keep my mouth shut 
you’ve got to keep yours shut. No blabbing to 


A PROPOSITION 


185 


Tim Otis or Clint Thayer or anyone else. This is 
just between you and me, old man. Now what do 
you say?” 

“The thing’s as crazy as it is rotten, Walton! 
How am I to get off the team without having it 
look funny?” 

“And how much do I care whether it looks 
funny or not? That’s up to you. You can play 
sick or you can get out there and mix your signals 
a few times or you can bite Robey in the leg. I 
don’t give a hang what you do so long as you do 
it, and do it between now and Saturday. That’s 
right, sit down and look at it sensibly. Mull it 
over awhile. There’s no hurry. ’ ’ 


CHAPTER XVI 


DON VISITS THE DOCTOB 

“What did Walton want of you?” asked Tim a 
half-hour later, when the occupants of Number 6 
were settled at opposite sides of the table for 
study. 

“Walton?” repeated Don vaguely. “Oh, noth¬ 
ing especial.” 

“Nothing especial? Then why the mysterious 
summons? Did he make any crack about that 
little escapade of ours?” 

“He mentioned it. Shut up and let me get to 
work, Tim.” 

“Mentioned it how? What did he say? Any 
chance of beating him up? I’ve always had a 
longing, away down deep inside me, Donald, to 
place my fist violently against some portion of 
Walton’s—er—facial contour. Say, that’s good, 
isn’t it? Facial contour’s decidedly good, Don.” 

“Fine,” responded the other listlessly. 

Tim peered across at him under the droplight. 
“Say, you look as if you’d lost a dozen dear 
186 


DON VISITS THE DOCTOR 187 

friends. Anything wrong? Look here, has Wal¬ 
ton been acting nasty ?” 

“Don’t be a chump, Tim. I’m all right. Or, 
anyway, I’m only sort of—sort of tired. Dry up 
and let me stuff.” 

“Oh, very well, but you needn’t be so haughty 
about it. I don’t want to share your secrets with 
dear Harry. Everyone to his taste, as the old lady 
said when she kissed the cow ” 

Tim’s sarcasm, however, brought no response, 
and presently, after growling a little while he 
pawed his books over and dropped the subject, to 
Don’s relief, and silence fell. Don made a fine 
pretence of studying, but most of the time he 
couldn’t have told what book lay before him. 
When the hour was up Tim, who had by then 
returned to his usual condition of cheerful good 
nature, tried to induce Don to go over to Hensey 
to call on Larry Jones, who, it seemed, had per¬ 
fected a most novel and marvellous trick with a 
ruler and two glasses of water. But Don refused 
to be enticed and Tim went off alone, gravely 
cautioning his room-mate against melancholia. 

“Try to keep your mind off your troubles, Don¬ 
ald. Think of bright and happy things, like me or 
the pretty birds. Remember that nothing is ever 
quite as bad as we think it is, that every line has 


188 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


a silver clouding and that—that it’s always dawn- 
est before the dark. Farewell, you old grouch!” 

Don didn’t have to pretend very hard the next 
day that he was feeling ill, for an almost sleepless 
night, spent in trying to find some way out of his 
difficulties, had left him hollow-eyed and pale. 
Breakfast had been a farce and dinner a mere 
empty pretence, and between the two meals he 
had fared illy in classes. It was scarcely more 
than an exaggeration to tell Coach Robey that he 
didn’t feel well enough to play, and the coach 
readily believed him and gave him over to the 
mercies of Danny Moore. 

The trainer tried hard to get Don to enumerate 
some tangible symptoms, but Don could only re¬ 
peat that he was dreadfully tired and out of sorts. 
“Eat anything that didn’t agree with you?” asked 
Danny. 

“No, I didn’t eat much of anything. I didn’t 
have any appetite.” 

“Sure, that was sensible, anyway. I’ll be after 
giving you a tonic, me boy. Take it like I tell you, 
do ye mind, keep oft your feet and get a good 
sleep. After breakfast come to me in the gym 
and I’ll have a look at you.” 

Don took the tonic—when he thought of it—ate 
a fair supper and went early to bed, not so much 


DON VISITS THE DOCTOR 


189 


in the hope of curing his ailment as because he 
couldn’t keep his eyes open any longer. He slept 
pretty well, but was dimly conscious of waking 
frequently during the night, and when morning 
came felt fully as tired as when he had retired. 
Breakfast was beyond him, although Mr. Robey, 
his attention drawn to Don by Harry Walton’s 
innocent “ You ’re looking pretty bum, Gilbert,” 
counselled soft boiled eggs and hot milk. Don 
dallied with the eggs and drank part of the milk 
and was glad to escape as soon as he could. 

Danny gave him a very thorough inspection in 
the rubbing room after breakfast, but could find 
nothing wrong. “Sure, you’re as sound as Colin 
Meagher’s fiddle, me boy. Where is it it 
hurts ye?” 

“It doesn’t hurt anywhere, Danny,” responded 
Don. “I’m all right, I suppose, only I don’t feel 
—don’t feel very fit.” 

“A bit fine, you are, and I’m thinking you’d bet¬ 
ter lay off the work for today. Be outdoors as 
much as you can, but don’t be tiring yourself out. 
Have you taken the tonic like I told ye ? ” 

“I’ve taken enough of the beastly stuff,” an¬ 
swered Don listlessly. 

Danny laughed. “Sure, it’s the fine-tasting 
medicine, lad. Keep at it. And listen to me, now. 


190 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


If you want to play agin Claflin, Donny, you do as 
I’m tellin’ you and don’t be thinkin’ you know 
more about it than I do. Sure, Robey won’t look 
at ye at all, come a week from tomorrow, if you 
don’t brace up.” 

“Oh, I’m all right, Danny, thanks. Maybe if I 
rest off today I’ll be fine tomorrow.” 

“That’s what I’m tellin’ you. See that ye 
do it.” 

That afternoon he watched practice from the 
bench without getting into togs and saw Harry 
Walton play at left guard. He would much rather 
have remained away from the field, but to have 
done so might, he thought, have looked queer. 
Coach Robey was solicitous about him, but appar¬ 
ently did not take his indisposition very seriously. 
“Take it easy, Gilbert,” he said, “and don’t 
worry. You’ll be all right for tomorrow, I guess. 
You’ve been working pretty hard, my boy. Bet¬ 
ter pull a blanket over your shoulders. This 
breeze is rather biting. Can’t have you laid up 
for long, you know. ’ ’ 

Harry Walton performed well that afternoon, 
playing with a vim and dash that was something 
of a revelation to his team-mates. Tim was evi¬ 
dently troubled when he walked back to hall with 
Don after practice. “For the love of mud, Don,” 


DON VISITS THE DOCTOR 


191 


he pleaded, “get over it and come back! Did you 
see the way Walton played today? If he gets in 
tomorrow and plays like that against Chambers 
Robey ’ll be handing him the place! What the 
dickens is wrong with you, anyway?” 

“I’m just tired,” responded Don. 

i 1 Tired ! 9 9 Tim was puzzled. ‘ ‘ What for ? You 
haven’t worked since day before yesterday. What 
you’ve got is malaria or something. Tell you 
what we’ll do, Don; we’ll beat it over to the doc¬ 
tor’s after supper, eh?” 

But Don shook his head. “Danny’s tonic is all 
I need,” he said. “I dare say I’ll be feeling great 
in the morning.” 

“You dare say you will! Don’t you feel sure 
you will? Because I’ve got to tell you, Donald, 
that this is a plaguy bad time to get laid 
off, son. If you’re not a regular little Bright 
Eyes by Monday Robey’ll can you as sure as 
shooting!” 

“I wouldn’t much care if he did,” muttered 
Don. 

“You wouldn’t much- Say, are you crazy?” 

Tim stopped short on the walk and viewed his 
chum in amazement. “ Is it your brain that’s gone 
back on you? Don’t you want to play against 
Claflin?” 


192 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“I suppose so. Yes, of course I do, but-” 

“Then don’t talk like a piece of cheese! You’ll 
come with me to the doctor after supper if I have 
to drag you there by one heel ! 9 9 

And so go he did, and the doctor looked at his 
tongue and felt his pulse and “pawed him over,” 
as Don put it, and ended by patting him on the 
back and accepting a nice bright half-dollar—half- 
price to Academy students—in exchange for a 
prescription. 

“You’re a little nervous,” said the doctor. 
“Thinking too much about that football game, I 
guess. Don’t do it. Put it out of your mind. 
Take that medicine every two hours according to 
directions on the bottle and you ’ll be all right, my 
boy.” 

Don thanked him, slipped the prescription in a 
pocket and headed for school. But Tim grabbed 
him and faced him about. “You don’t swallow 
the prescription, Donald,” he said. “You take it 
to a druggist and he gives you something in a bot¬ 
tle. That’s what you swallow, the stuff in the 
bottle. I’m not saying that it mightn’t do you 
just as much good to eat the paper, but we’d 
better play by the rules. So come on, you lunk¬ 
head.” 

“Oh, I forgot,” murmured Don. 


DON VISITS THE DOCTOR 


193 


“Of course you did,” agreed the other sar¬ 
castically. “And, look here, if anyone asks 
you! your name, it's Donald Croft Gilbert. 
Think you can remember that? Donald 
Croft-” 

“Oh, dry up,” said Don. “How much will this 
fool medicine cost me?” 

“How much have you got?” 

“About eighty cents, I think.” 

“It’ll cost you eighty cents, then. Ask me 
something easier. I don’t pretend to know how 
druggists do it, hut they can always look right 
through your clothes and count your money. 
Never knew it to fail!” 

But it failed this time, or else the druggist 
counted wrong, for the prescription was a dollar 
and Tim had to make up the balance. He in¬ 
sisted on Don taking the first dose then and there, 
so that he could get in another before bedtime, 
and Don meekly obeyed. After he had swallowed 
it he begged a glass of soda water from the drug¬ 
gist to take the taste out of his mouth, and the 
druggist, doubtless realising the demands of the 
occasion, stood treat to them both. On the way 
back Tim figured it that if they had only insisted 
on having ice-cream sodas they would have re¬ 
duced the price of the medicine to its rightful 


194 


LEFT GUABD GILBERT 


cost. Don, though, firmly insisted that it was 
worth every cent of what he had paid for it. 

“No one,” he said convincedly, “could get that 
much nastiness into a small bottle for less than a 
dollar!” 


CHAPTER XVII 


DROPPED FROM THE TEAM 

Whether owing to Danny Moore’s tonic, the doc¬ 
tor’s prescription or a good night’s rest, Don 
awoke the next morning feeling perfectly well 
physically, and his first waking moments were 
cheered by the knowledge. Then, however, recol¬ 
lection of the fact that physical well-being was 
exactly what wasn’t required under the circum¬ 
stances brought quick reaction, and he jumped out 
of bed to look at himself in the mirror above his 
dresser in the hope of finding pale cheeks and 
hollow eyes and similar evidences of impending 
dissolution. But Fate had played a sorry trick on 
him! His cheeks were not in the least pale, nor 
were his eyes sunken. In short, he looked particu¬ 
larly healthy, and if other evidence of the fact was 
needed it was supplied by Tim. Tim, when Don 
turned regretfully away from the glass, was sit¬ 
ting up and observing him with pleased relief. 

i ‘ Ata boy! ’ ’ exclaimed Tim. ‘‘ Feeling fine and 
dandy, aren’t you? I guess that medicine was 
cheap at the price, after all! You look about a 
195 


196 LEFT GUARD GILBERT 

hundred per cent better than you did yesterday, 
Donald.” 

Don started to smile, caught himself in time and 
drew a long sigh. “ You can’t always tell by a fel¬ 
low’s looks how he’s really feeling,” he replied 
darkly. 

“Oh, run away and play! What’s the matter 
with you? You’ve got colour in your face and 
look great.” 

“Too much colour, I’m afraid,” said Don, 
shaking his head pessimistically. “I guess—I 
guess I’ve got a little fever.” 

Tim stared at him puzzledly. “Fever? What 
for? I mean- Say, are you fooling?” 

“No. My face is sort of hot, honest, Tim.” 
And so it was, possibly the consciousness of 
fibbing and the difficulty of doing it successfully 
was responsible for the flush. Tim pushed his 
legs out of bed and viewed his friend disgust¬ 
edly. 

“Don, you’re getting to he one of those klepto¬ 
maniacs—no, that isn’t it! What’s the word? 
Hydrochondriacs, isn’t it? Anyway, whatever it 
is, you’re it! You’ve got so you imagine you’re 
sick when you aren’t. Forget it, Donald, and 
cheer up! ” 

“Oh, I’ll he all right, thanks,” responded the 


DROPPED FROM THE TEAM 197 

other dolefully. “I guess I’m lots better than 
I was.” 

‘ ‘ Of course you are! Why, hang it, man, you’ve 
simply got to be 0. K. today! If you’re not 
Robey’ll can you as sure as shooting! Smile for 
the gentleman, Don, and then get a move on and 
come to breakfast. ’ ’ 

“I don’t think I want any breakfast, thanks.” 

“You will when you smell it. Want me to start 
the water for you?” 

“If I was a hydrochondriac I wouldn’t want any 
water, would I?” 

“Hypochondriac’s what I meant, I guess. 
Hurry up before the mob gets there.” 

Tim struggled into his bath-robe and pattered 
off down the corridor, leaving Don to follow at his 
leisure. But, instead of following, Don seated 
himself on the edge of his bed and viewed life 
gloomily. If Tim refused to believe in his illness, 
how was he to convince Coach Robey of it? He 
might, he reflected, rub talcum on his face, but he 
was afraid that wouldn’t deceive anyone, the 
coach least of all. And, according to his bargain 
with Harry Walton, he must sever his connection 
with the team today. If he didn’t Walton would 
go to the principal and tell what he had witnessed 
from his window that Saturday night, and not 


198 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


only he, but Tim and Clint as well, would sutler. 
And, still worse, the team would be beaten by 
Claflin as surely as—as Tim was shouting to him 
from the bathroom! He got up and donned his 
bath-robe and set otf down the corridor with lag¬ 
ging feet, so wretched in mind by this time that it 
required no great effort of imagination to believe 
himself ailing in body. 

To his surprise—and rather to his disgust— 
he found himself intensely hungry at breakfast 
and it was all he could do to refuse the steak and 
baked potato set before him. Under the apprais¬ 
ing eye of Mr. Robey, he drank a glass of milk and 
nibbled at a piece of toast, his very soul longing 
for that steak and a couple of soft eggs! After¬ 
ward, when he reported to Danny, the trainer 
produced fresh discouragement in him. 

‘ 6 Fine, me boy! ’ ’ declared the trainer. 1 * You ’re 
as good as ever, aren’t you? Keep in the air all 
you can and go light with the dinner. ’ ’ 

“I—I don’t feel very fit,” muttered Don. 

“Get along with you! You’re the picture of 
health! Don’t be saying anything like that to Mr. 
Robey, or he might believe it and bench you. Run 
along now and mind what I tell you. Game’s at 
two-fifteen today.” 

It was fortunate that Don had but two recita- 


DROPPED FROM THE TEAM 199 


tions that morning, for he was in no condition for 
such unimportant things. His mind was too full 
of what was before him. At dinner it was easy 
enough to obey Danny’s command and eat lightly, 
for he was far too worried to want food. The 
noon meal was eaten early in order that the play¬ 
ers might have an hour for digestion before they 
went to the field. Chambers came swinging up to 
the school at half-past one, in all the carriages to 
be found at the station, while her supporters 
trailed after on foot. The stands filled early and, 
by the time the Chambers warriors trotted on to 
the gridiron for their practice, looked gay and 
colourful with waving pennants. 

Don kept close to Tim from the time dinner was 
over until they reached the locker-room in the 
gymnasium, Tim was puzzled and disgusted over 
his chum’s behaviour and secretly began to think 
that perhaps, after all, he was not in the condition 
his appearance told him to be. Don listlessly 
dragged his playing togs on and was dressed by 
the time Coach Robey came in. He hoped that 
the coach would give him his opportunity then to 
declare his unfitness for work, but Mr. Robey paid 
no attention to him. He said the usual few words 
of admonition to the players, conferred with Man¬ 
ager Morton and the trainer and disappeared 


200 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


again. Captain Edwards led the way out of the 
building at a few minutes before two and they 
jogged down to the field and, heralded by a long 
cheer from the stand, took their places on the 
benches. It was a fine day for football, bright and 
windless and with a true November nip in the 
air. 

Chambers yielded half the gridiron and Coach 
Robey approached the bench. ‘ ‘ All right, first and 
second squads,” he said cheerfully. “Try your 
signals out, but take it easy. Rollins, you’d better 
try a half-dozen goals. Martin, too. How about 
you, Gilbert? You feeling all right?” 

Don felt the colour seeping out of his cheeks as 
the coach turned toward him, and there was an in¬ 
stant of silence before he replied with lowered 
eyes. 

“N-no, sir, I’m not feeling very—very fit. I’m 
sorry.” 

“You’re not?” Mr. Robey’s voice had an edge. 
“Danny says you’re perfectly fit. What’s 
wrong ?’ ’ 

“I—I don’t know, sir. I don’t feel—well.” 

A number of the players still within hearing 
turned to listen. Mr. Robey viewed Don with a 
puzzled frown. Then he shrugged impatiently. 

“You know best, of course,” he said shortly, 


DROPPED FROM THE TEAM 201 


“but if you don’t work today, Gilbert, you’re 
plumb out of it. I can’t keep your place open for 
you forever, you know. What do you say? Want 
to try it?” 

Don wished that the earth under his feet would 
open up and swallow him. He tried to return the 
coach’s gaze, but his eyes wandered. The first 
time he tried to speak he made no sound, and when 
he did find his voice it was so low that the coach 
impatiently bade him speak up. 

“I don’t think it would be any good, sir,” re¬ 
plied Don huskily. “I—I’m not feeling very 
well.” 

There was a long silence. Then Mr. Robey’s 
voice came to him as cold as ice. “Very well, Gil¬ 
bert, clean your locker out and hand in your 
things to the trainer. Walton! ’ ’ 

“Yes, sir?” 

“Go in at left guard on the first squad.” Mr. 
Robey turned again to Don. “Gilbert,” he said 
very quietly, “I don’t understand you. You are 
perfectly able to play, and you know it. The only 
explanation that occurs to me is that you’re in a 
funk. If that’s so it is a fortunate thing for all 
of us that we’ve discovered it now instead of later. 
There’s no place on this team, my boy, for a 
quitter.” 


202 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


Coach and players turned away, leaving Don 
standing alone there before the bench. Miserably 
he groped his way to it and sat down with hang¬ 
ing head. His eyes were wet and he was horribly 
afraid that someone would see it. A hand fell on 
his shoulder and he glanced up into Tim’s troubled 
face. 

“I heard, Don,” said Tim. “Pm frightfully 
sorry, old man. Are you sure you can’t do it?” 

Don shook his head silently. Tim sighed. 

“Gee, it’s rotten, ain’t it? Maybe he didn’t 
mean what he said, though. Maybe, if you’re all 
right Monday, he’ll give you another chance. I’m 
—I’m beastly sorry, Don!” 

The hand on his shoulder pressed reassuringly 
and drew away and Tim hurried out to his place. 
Presently Don took a deep breath, got to his feet 
and, trying his hardest t6 look unconcerned but 
making sorry work of it, skirted the stand and 
retraced his steps to the gymnasium. His one 
desire was to get out of sight before any of the 
fellows found him, and so he pulled off his togs 
as quickly as he might, got into his other clothes, 
made a bundle of his suit and stockings and shoes 
and left them in the rubbing-room where Danny 
could not fail to find them and then hurried out of 
the building and through the deserted yard to 


DROPPED FROM THE TEAM 203 

Billings and the sunlit silence and emptiness of his 
room. 

There was very little consolation in the knowl¬ 
edge that he had done only what was right. Mar¬ 
tyrdom has its drawbacks. He had lost his posi¬ 
tion with the team and had been publicly branded 
a quitter. The fact that his conscience was not 
only clear but even approving didn’t help much. 
Being thought a quitter, a coward, hurt badly. If 
he could have got at Harry Walton any time dur¬ 
ing the ensuing half-hour it would have gone hard 
with that youth. After a time, though, he got com¬ 
mand of his feelings again and, since there was 
nothing better to do, he seated himself at the win¬ 
dow and watched as much of the football game as 
was visible from there. Once or twice he was able 
to forget his trouble for a brief moment. 

Chambers put up a good game that day and it 
was all the home team could do to finally win out 
by the score of 3 to 0. For two periods Chambers 
had Brimfield virtually on the run, and only a 
fine fighting spirit that flashed into evidence under 
the shadow of her goal saved the latter from de¬ 
feat. As it was, luck took a hand in matters when 
a poor pass from centre killed Chambers’s chance 
of scoring by a field-goal in the second quarter. 

Brimfield showed better work in the second half 


204 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


and twice got the ball inside the visitor’s twenty- 
yard line, once in the third period and again 
shortly before the final whistle blew. The first 
opportunity to score was lost when Carmine called 
for line-plunges to get the pigskin across and 
Howard, who was playing in St. Clair’s position 
because of a slight injury to the regular left half, 
fumbled for a four-yard loss. Chambers rallied 
and took the ball away a minute later. In the 
fourth period dazzling runs outside of tackles by 
Tim Otis and hard line-plugging by Rollins and 
Howard took the ball from Brimfield’s thirty-five 
to the enemy’s twenty-five. There a forward pass 
grounded—Chambers had a remarkable defence 
against that play—and, on third down, Rollins slid 
off left tackle for enough to reach the twenty. 
But with only one down remaining and time nearly 
up, a try-at-goal was the only course left, and 
Rollins, standing squarely on the thirty-yard line, 
drop-kicked a scanty victory. 

In some ways that contest was disappointing, 
in others encouraging. Team-play was more in 
evidence than in any previous game and the 
maroon-and-grey backfield had performed pro¬ 
digiously. And the plays had, as a general thing, 
gone off like clock-work. But there were weak 
places in the line still. Pryme, at right guard, had 


DROPPED FROM THE TEAM 205 


proved an easy victim for the enemy and the same 
was true, in a lesser degree, of Harry Walton, 
on the other side of centre. And Crewe, at right 
tackle, had allowed himself to be boxed time after 
time. It might be said for Crewe, however, that 
today he was playing opposite an opponent who 
was more than clever. But the way in which 
Chambers had torn holes in Brimfield’s first de¬ 
fence promised poorly for next Saturday and the 
spectators went away from the field feeling a bit 
less sanguine than a week before. “No team that 
is weak at both guard positions can hope to win,” 
was the general verdict, and it was fully realised 
that Claflin’s backs were better than Chambers’s. 
For a day or two there was much talk of a petition 
to the faculty asking for the reinstatement of Tom 
Hall, but it progressed no further than talk. Josh, 
it was known, was not the kind to reverse his de¬ 
cision for any reason they could present. 

And yet, although the weekly faculty conference 
on Monday night had no written petition to con¬ 
sider, the subject of Tom’s reinstatement did come 
before it and in a totally unprecedented manner. 


CHAPTER XVIII 


“GOOD-BYE, TIMMY !’’ 

Tim found a dejected and most unsatisfactory 
chum when he got back to the room after the 
Chambers game that Saturday afternoon. All of 
Tim’s demands for an explanation of the whole 
puzzling affair met only with evasion. Don was 
not only uncommunicative, but a trifle short-tem¬ 
pered, a condition quite unusual for him. All Tim 
could get from him was that he “felt perfectly 
punk” and wasn’t going to try to change Mr. 
Robey’s decision. 

“I’m through,’’ he said. 44 1 don’t blame Robey 
a bit. I’m no use on the team as I am. He’d be 
foolish to bother with me.” 

44 Well, all I can say,” returned Tim, with a 
sigh of exasperation, 4 4 is that the whole thing is 
mighty funny. I guess there’s more to it than 
you’re telling. You look like thirty cents, all right 
enough, but I’ll wager anything you like that you 
could go out there and play just as good a game 
as ever on Monday if Robey would let you and you 
cared to try. Now couldn’t you?” 

206 


“GOOD-BYE, TIMMY!” 


207 


“I don’t know. What does it matter, anyhow? 
I tell you I’m all through, and so there’s no use 
chewing it over.” 

i 1 Oh, all right. Nuff said. ’ ’ Tim walked to the 
window, his hands thrust deep in his pockets, and, 
after a minute’s contemplation of the darkening 
prospect without, observed haltingly: “Look 
here, Don. If you hear things you don’t like, 
don’t get up on your ear, eh?” 

“What sort of things?” demanded the other. 

Tim hesitated a long moment before he took 
the plunge. Then: “Well, some of the fellows 
don’t understand, Don. You can’t altogether 
blame them, I suppose. I shut two or three of 
them up, but there’s bound to be some talk, you 
know. Some fellows always manage to think of 
the meanest things possible. But what fellows 
like that say isn’t worth bothering about. So 
just you sit snug, old man. They’ve already found 
that they can’t say that sort of thing when I’m 
around.” 

“Thanks,” said Don quietly. “What sort of 
things do you mean?” 

“Oh, anything.” 

“You mean that they’re calling me a quitter?” 

“Well, some of them heard Robey get that off 
and they’re repeating it like a lot of silly parrots. 


208 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


I called Holt down good and hard. Told him I’d 
punch his ugly face if he talked that way again.” 

“Don’t bother/’ said Don listlessly. “I guess 
I do look like a quitter, all right.’’ 

“Piffle! And, hang it all, Robey had no busi¬ 
ness saying that, Don! He couldn’t really be¬ 
lieve it.” 

“Why couldn’t he? On the face of it, Tim, I’d 
say that I looked a whole lot like a quitter.” 

“But that’s nonsense! Why would you or any 
fellow want to quit just before the Claflin game? 
Why, all the hard work’s done with, man! Only 
a little signal practice to go through with now. 
Why would you want to quit? It’s poppycock!” 

“Well, some fellows do get cold feet just be¬ 
fore the big game. We’ve both known cases of it. 
Look at-” 

“Yes, I know what you’re going to say, but that 
was different. He never had any spunk, anyway. 
Nobody believed in him but Robey, and Robey was 
wrong, just as he is about you. Anyway, all I’m 
trying to say is that there’s no use getting waxy 
if some idiot shoots off his mouth. The fellows 
who really count don’t believe you a—a quitter. 
And the whole business will blow over in a couple 
of days. Look how they talked about Tom at 
first!” 


“GOOD-BYE, TIMMY!” 


209 


“They didn’t call him a quitter, though. They 
were just mad because he’d done a fool thing and 
lost the team. I wouldn’t blame anyone for think¬ 
ing me a—a coward, and I can’t resent it if they 
say it.” 

“Can’t, eh! Well, lean!” 

Don smile wanly. “Thought you were telling 
me not to, Tim.” 

Tim muttered. There was silence for a minute 
in the twilit room. Then Tim switched on the 
lights and rolled up his sleeves preparatory to 
washing. “The whole thing’s perfectly rotten,” 
he growled, “but we’ll just have to make the best 
of it. Ten years from now--” 

“Yes, but it isn’t ten years from now that 
troubles me,” interrupted Don thoughtfully. “It 
—it’s right this minute. And tomorrow and the 
next day. And the day after that. I’ve a good 
mind to-” 

“To what!” demanded Tim from behind his 
sponge. 

‘ ‘ Nothing. I was just—thinking. ’ ’ 

“Well, stop it, then. You weren’t intended to 
think. You always do something silly when you 
get to thinking. Wash up and come on to sup¬ 
per.” 

“I’m not going over tonight,” answered Don. 



210 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


4 4 I’m not hungry. And, anyway, I don ’t feel quite 
like facing it yet.” 

“Now, look here,” began Tim severely, “if 

you’re going to take it like that- 

“I’m not, I guess. Only I’d rather not go to 
supper tonight. I am through at the training- 
table and I funk going back to the other table just 
now. Besides, I’m not the least bit hungry. You 
run along.” 

Tim observed him frowningly. 4 4 Well, all right. 
Only if it was me I’d take the bull by the horns 
and see it through. Fellows will talk more if you 
let them see that you give a hang. ’ ’ 

4 4 They’ll talk enough anyway, I dare say. A 
little more won’t matter.” 

“I just hope Holt gets gay again,” said Tim 
venomously, shying the towel in the general direc¬ 
tion of the rack and missing it by a foot. 4 4 Want 
me to bring something over to you ? ’ ’ 

4 4 No, thanks. I don’t want a thing. ’ ’ 

4 4 We-ell, I guess I ’ll beat it then. ’ ’ Tim loitered 
uncertainly at the door. “I say, Donald, old 
scout, buck up, eh?” 

44 Oh, yes, I’ll be all right, Timmy. Don’t you 
worry about me. And—and thanks, you know, 
for—for calling Holt down.” 

44 Oh, that!” Tim chuckled. 44 Holt wasn’t the 


211 


“GOOD-BYE, TIMMY!” 

only one I called down either.” Then, realising 
that he had not helped the situation any by the 
remark, he tried to squirm out of it. “Of course, 
Holt was the one, you know. The others didn’t 
really say anything, or—or mean anything-” 

Don laughed. “That’ll do, Tim. Beat it!” 

And Tim, red-faced and confused, “heat it.” 

For the next five minutes doors in the corridor 
opened and shut and footfalls sounded as the fel¬ 
lows hurried off to Wendell. But I doubt if Don 
heard the sounds, for he was sunk very low in 
the chair and his eyes were fixed intently on space. 
Presently he drew in his legs, sat up and pulled 
his watch from his pocket. A moment of specula¬ 
tion followed. Then he jumped from the chair as 
one whose mind is at last made up and went to 
his closet. From the recesses he dragged forth 
his bag and laid it open on his bed. From the 
closet hooks he took down a few garments and 
tossed them beside the bag and then crossed to his 
dresser and pulled open the drawers. Don had 
decided to accept Coach Robey’s title. He was 
going to quit I 

There was a train at six-thirty-four and another 
at seven-one for New York. With luck, he could 
get the first. If he missed that he was certain of 
the second. The dormitory was empty, it was 


212 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


quite dark outside by now and there was scarcely 
a chance of anyone ’s seeing him. If he hurried he 
could be at the station before Tim could return 
from supper. Or, even if he didn’t get away until 
the seven-one train, he would be clear of the hall 
before Tim could discover his absence and sur¬ 
mise the reason for it. To elude Tim was the all- 
important thing, for Tim would never approve and 
would put all sorts of obstacles in his way. In 
fact, it would be a lot like Tim to hold him back 
by main force! Don’s heart sank for a moment. 
It was going to be frightfully hard to leave old 
Timmy. Perhaps they might meet again at col¬ 
lege in a couple of years, but they would not be 
likely to see each other before that time, and even 
that depended on so many things that it couldn’t 
be confidently counted on. 

Don paused in his hurried selection of articles 
from the dresser drawers and dropped into a 
chair at the table. But, with the pad before him 
and pen in hand, he shook his head. A note would 
put Tim wise to what was happening and perhaps 
allow him to get to the station in time to make a 
fuss. No, it would be better to write to him later; 
perhaps from New York tonight, for Don was 
pretty sure that he wouldn’t be able to get a 
through train before morning. So, with another 


“GOOD-BYE, TIMMY!” 


213 


glance at his watch, he began to pack again, throw¬ 
ing things in every which-way in his feverish de¬ 
sire to complete the task and leave the building 
before Tim got back. He came across a scarf that 
Tim had admired and laid it back in the top 
drawer. It had never been worn and Tim should 
have it. And as he hurried back and forth he 
thought of other things he would like Tim to have. 
There was his tennis racket, the one Tim always 
borrowed when Don wasn’t using it, and a scarf- 
pin made of a queer, rough nugget of opal matrix. 
He would tell Tim he was to have those and not 
to pack them with the other things. The thought 
of making the gifts almost cheered him for awhile, 
and, together with the excitement of running 
away, caused him to hum a little tune under his 
breath as he jammed the last articles in the bag 
and snapped it shut. 

It was sixteen minutes past now. He would, he 
acknowledged, never be able to make the six- 
thirty-four, with that burden to carry. But the 
seven-one would do quite as well, and he wouldn’t 
have to hurry so. In that case, then, why not 
leave just a few words of good-bye for Tim? He 
could put the note somewhere where Tim wouldn’t 
find it until later; tuck it, for instance, under the 
bed-clothes so that he would find it when he pulled 


214 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


them down. He hesitated a moment and then set 
his hag down by the door, dropped his overcoat 
and umbrella on the bed and seated himself again 
at the table. Tim was never known to take less 
than a half-hour for supper and he still had a 
good ten minutes ’ leeway: 

“Dear Timmy [he wrote hurriedly], I’m off. 
It’s no use sticking around any longer. Fellows 
aren’t going to forget as soon as you said and I 
can’t stay on here and be thought a quitter. So 
I’m taking the seven-one to New York and will be 
home day after tomorrow. I wish you would pack 
my things up for me when you get time. There 
isn’t any great hurry. I’ve got enough for awhile. 
You’re to keep the racket and the blue and white 
tie and the opal matrix pin and anything else you 
like to remember me by. Please do this, Tim. I’ll 
write from home and tell you about sending the 
trunk. I’m awfully sorry, Tim, and I’m going to 
miss you like anything, but I shan’t ever come 
back here. Maybe we will get together again at 
college. I hope so. You try, will you? Good-bye, 
Tim, old pal. We’ve had some dandy times 
together, haven’t we? And you’ve been an A1 
chum to me and I wish I wasn’t going off without 
saying good-bye to you decently. But I’ve got to. 
So good-bye, Timmy, old man. Think of me now 
and then like I will of you. Good-bye. 

“Your friend always, 

“Don.” 


“GOOD-BYE, TIMMY!” 


215 


That note took longer to write than he had 
counted on, and when he got up from the table 
and looked at his watch he was alarmed to find 
that it was almost half-past six. He folded the 
paper and tucked it just under the clothes at the 
head of Tim’s bed, took a last glance about the 
room, picked up coat and umbrella and turned out 
the light. Then he strode toward the door, grop¬ 
ing for his bag. 


CHAPTER XIX 


FRIENDS FALL OUT 

Tim didn’t enjoy supper very much that evening. 
The game had left him pretty weary of body and 
mind, and on top of that was Don and his trouble, 
and try as he might he couldn’t get them out of his 
thoughts. Mr. Robey was not at table; someone 
said he had gone to New York for over Sunday; 
and so Tim didn’t have to make a pretence of 
eating more than he wanted. And he wanted very 
little. A slice of cold roast beef, rather too rare 
to please him, about an eighth of one of the in¬ 
evitable baked potatoes, a few sips of milk and a 
corner of a slice of toast as hard as a shingle, and 
Tim was more than satisfied. Tonight he was not 
especially interested in the talk, which, a£ usual 
after a game, was all football, and didn’t see any 
good reason for sitting there after he had finished 
and listening to it. All during his brief meal he 
was on the alert for any mention of Don’s name, 
and more than once he glared, almost encourag¬ 
ingly, at Holt. But Holt had already learned his 
lesson and was doing very little talking, and none 
216 


FEIENDS FALL OUT 


217 


at all about Don. Nor was the absent player’s 
name mentioned by anyone at that table, although 
what might be being said of him at the other Tim 
had no way of knowing. He stayed on a few min¬ 
utes after he had finished, eyeing the apple-sauce 
and graham crackers coldly, and then asked Steve 
Edwards to excuse him. 

“Off his feed,” remarked Carmine as Tim 
passed down the dining hall on his way out. 
“First time I ever saw old Tim have nerves.” 

“It’s Don Gilbert, probably,” said Clint 
Thayer. “They’re great pals. Tim’s worried 
about him, I guess.” 

“ What do you make of it, Steve?” asked Crewe, 
helping himself to a third slice of meat. 

‘ ‘What is there to make of it?” asked Steve 
carelessly. “The chap’s all out of shape, I sup¬ 
pose. I don’t know what his trouble is, but I 
guess he’s a goner for this year.” 

“It’s awfully funny, isn’t it?” asked Rollins. 
“Gilbert always struck me as an awfully plucky 
player.” 

“Has anyone said he isn’t?” inquired Clint 
quietly. 

6 ‘ N-no, no, of course not! ’ ’ Rollins flushed. ‘ ‘ I 
didn’t mean anything like that, Clint. Only I 
don’t see-” 



218 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“He hasn’t been looking very fit lately,” offered 
Harry Walton, “I noticed it two or three days 
ago. Too bad!” 

“Yes, you’re feeling perfectly wretched about 
it, I guess,” said big Thursby drily, causing a 
smile around the table. Walton shrugged and 
rewarded the speaker with one of his smiles that 
were always unfortunately like leers. 

“Oh, I can feel sorry for Him,” said Walton, 
“even if I do get his place. Gilbert gave me an 
awfully good fight for it.” 

“Oh, was there a fight?” asked Thursby inno¬ 
cently. ‘ t I didn’t notice any. ’ ’ 

Thursby got a real laugh this time and Harry 
Walton joined in to save his face, but with no very 
good grace. 

“If anyone has an idea that Don Gilbert is 
scared and quit for that reason,” observed St. 
Clair, “he’d better keep it to himself. Or, any¬ 
how, he’d better not air it when Tim is about. He 
nearly bit my head off in the gym because I said 
that Don was a chump to give up like this a week 
before the Claflin game. Tim flared up like—like 
a gasoline torch and wanted to fight! I didn’t 
mean a thing by my innocent remark, but I had the 
dickens of a time trying to prove it to Tim! And 
he almost jumped into you, too, didn’t he, Holt?” 


FRIENDS FALL OUT 219 

“ Yes, he did, the touchy beggar! You all heard 
what Robey said, and-” 

“I didn’t hear,” interrupted Steve, “and-” 

“Why, he said-” 

“And, as I was about to remark, Holt, I don’t 
want to. And it will be just as decent for those 
who did hear to forget. Robey says lots of things 
he doesn’t mean or believe. Perhaps that was one 
of them. I’m for Don. If he says he’s sick, he is 
sick. You’ve all seen him play for two years and 
you ought to know that there isn’t a bit of yellow 
anywhere in his make-up.” 

“That’s so,” agreed several, and others nodded, 
Holt amongst them. 

“I didn’t say he was a quitter, Steve. I was 
only repeating what Robey said, and Tim hap¬ 
pened to hear me. Gee, I like Don as well as any 
of you. Gee, didn’t I play a whole year with him 
on the second?” 

“Gee, you did indeed!” replied Crewe, and, 
laughing, the fellows pushed back their chairs and 
left the table. 

Tim didn’t hurry on his way along the walk to 
Billings, for he was earnestly trying to think of 
some scheme that would take Don’s mind off his 
trouble that evening. Perhaps he could get Don 
to take a good, long walk. Walking always worked 



220 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


wonders in his own case when, as very infre¬ 
quently happened, he had a fit of the blues. Yes, 
he would propose a walk, he told himself. And 
then he groaned at the thought of it, for he was 
very tired and he ached in a large number of 
places! 

Only a few windows were lighted in Billings as 
he approached it, for most of the fellows were 
still in dining hall and the rule requiring the turn¬ 
ing out of lights during absence from rooms was 
strictly enforced. Only the masters were ex¬ 
empted, and Tim noticed as he passed Mr. Daley’s 
study that the droplight was turned low by one 
of those cunning dimming attachments which Tim 
had always envied the instructor the possession 
of. Tim would have had one of those long ago 
could he have put it to any practical use. He 
passed through the doorway and down the dimly 
lighted corridor, the rubber-soled shoes which he 
affected in all seasons making little sound. He 
was surprised to see that no light showed through 
the transom of Number 6, and he paused outside 
the door a moment. Perhaps Don was asleep. In 
that case, it would be just as well to not disturb 
him. But, on the other hand, he might be just 
sitting there in the dark being miserable. Tim 
turned the knob and pushed the door open. 


FRIENDS FALL OUT 


221 


The light from the corridor and the fact that 
Don had stopped startledly at the sound of the 
turning knob prevented an actual collision be¬ 
tween them. Tim, pushing the door slowly shut 
behind him, viewed Don questioningly. “Hello,” 
he said, “where are you going!” 

“For a walk,” replied Don. 

“Why the coat and umbrella! And—oh, I 
see!” Tim’s glance took in the bag and compre¬ 
hension dawned. “So that’s it, eh!” 

There was an instant of silence during which 
Tim closed the door and leaned against it, hands 
in pockets and a thoughtful scowl on his face. 
Finally: 

“Yes, that’s it,” said Don defiantly. “I’m off 
for home.” 

“What’s the big idea!” 

“You know well enough, Tim. I—I’m not going 
to stay here and be—be pointed out as a quitter. 
I’m-” 

“Wait a sec! What are you doing now but 
quitting, you several sorts of a blind mule! Think 
you’re helping things any by—by running away! 
Don’t be a chump, Donald.” 

“That’s all well enough for you. It isn’t your 
funeral. I don’t care what they say about me if 
I don’t have to hear it. I’m sorry, Tim, but—but 


222 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


I’ve just got to do it. I—there’s a note for you 
in your bed. I didn’t expect you’d be back before 
Heft.” 

“I’ll bet you didn’t, son!” said Tim grimly. 
“Now let me tell you something, Don. You’re 
acting like a baby, that’s what you’re doing! It’s 
all fine enough to say that you don’t care what 
fellows say as long as you don’t hear it, but you 
don’t mean it, Don. You would care. And so 
would I. If you don’t want them to think you a 
quitter, for the love of mud don’t run away like— 
like one!” 

“I’ve thought of all that, Tim, but it’s the only 
thing to do.” 

‘ ‘ The only thing to do, your grandmother! The 
thing to do is to stick around and show folks that 
you’re not a quitter. Don’t you see that getting 
out is the one thing that’ll make them believe 
Robey was right?” 

“Oh, I dare say, but I’ve made up my mind, 
Tim. I’m going to get that seven-one train, old 
man, and I’ll have to beat it. If you want to walk 
along to the station with me-” 

4 ‘ And carry your bag f ’ ’ asked Tim sweetly. He 
turned the key in the lock and then dropped it in 
his pocket. Don took a stride forward, but was 
met by Tim’s challenging frown, “There’s no 



FRIENDS FALL OUT 


223 


seven-one train for you tonight, Donald,” said 
Tim quietly, "nor any other night. Put your bag 
down, old dear, and hang your overcoat back in 
the closet.” 

"Don’t act like a silly ass,” begged Don. "Put 
that key back and let me out, Tim!” 

"Yes, I will—like fun! The only way you’ll 
get that key will be by taking it out of my pocket, 
and by the time you do that the seven-one train 
will be half-way to the city.” 

"Please, Tim! You’re not acting like a good 
chum! Just you think-’ ’ 

"That’s just what I am acting like,” returned 
Tim, stepping past the other and switching on the 
lights. "And you’ll acknowledge it tomorrow. 
Just now you’re sort of crazy in the head. 
I’ll humour you as much as possible, Donald, 
but not to the extent of letting you make 
a perfect chump of yourself. Sit down and 
behave.” 

"Tim, I want that key,” said Don sternly. 

Tim shrugged. 41 Can’t have it, Don, unless you 
fight for it. And I’m not sure you’d get it then. 
Now look here-” 

"You’ve no right to keep me here!” 

"I don’t give a hang whether I’ve got the right 
or not. You ’re going to stay here. ’ ’ 



224 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


4 4 There are other trains/’ said Don coldly. 
“You can’t keep that door locked forever.” 

“I don’t intend to try, but it’ll stay locked until 
the last train tonight has whistled for the crossing 
back there. Make up your mind to that, son! ’ ’ 
Don looked irresolutely from Tim to the door 
and back again. He didn’t want to fight Tim the 
least bit in the world. He wasn’t so sure now that 
he wanted to get that train, either. But, having 
stated his purpose, he felt it encumbent on him to 
carry it out. Then his gaze fell on the windows 
and he darted toward them. 

But Tim had already thought of that way of 
escape and before Don had traversed half the dis¬ 
tance from door to windows Tim had planted him¬ 
self resolutely in the way. “No you don’t, Don¬ 
ald,” he said calmly. “You’ll have to lick me 
first, boy, and I’m feeling quite some scrappy!” 

“I don’t want to lick you,” said Don irritably, 
‘ ( but I mean to get that train. You’d better either 
give up that key or stand out of my way, Tim. ’ ’ 
“Neither, thanks. And, look here, if we get to 
scrapping Horace will hear us and then you won’t 
get away in any case. Be sensible, Don, and give 
it up. It can’t be done, old man.” 

“Will you unlock that door!” demanded Don 
angrily. 



“Will you unlock that door?” Demanded Don angrily 














FRIENDS FALL OUT 


225 


44 No, confound you, I won’t!” 

44 Then I’m going out by the window!” 

44 And I say you’re not.” Tim swiftly peeled 
off his coat. 4 4 Anyway, not in time to get that 
train.’ ’ 

Don dropped his bag to the floor and tossed 
overcoat and umbrella on his bed. 44 I’ve given 
you fair warning, Tim,” he said in a low voice. 
44 I don’t want to hurt you, but you’d better stand 
aside.” 

44 I don’t want to get hurt, Don,” replied the 
other quietly, 4 4 but if you insist, all right. 
I’m doing what I’d want you to do, Don, 
if I went crazy in the head. You may not 
like it now, but some day you’ll tell me I did 
right. ’ ’ 

4 4 You’re acting’ like a fool,” answered Don 
hotly. 44 It’s no business of yours if I want to get 
out of here. Now you let me pass, or it’ll be the 
worse for you! ’ ’ 

44 Don, will you listen to reason? Sit down 
calmly for five minutes and let’s talk this thing 
over. Will you do that?” 

44 No! And I won’t be dictated to by you, Tim 
Otis! Now get out of the way! ’ ’ 

44 You’ll have to put me out,” answered Tim 
with set jaw. 44 And you’re going to find that 


226 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


hard work, Donald. We’re both going to get hor¬ 
ribly mussed up, and-” 

But Tim didn’t finish his remark, for at that 
instant Don rushed him. Tim met the onslaught 
squarely and in a second they were struggling 
silently. No blows were struck. Don was bent 
only on getting the other out of the way and 
making his escape through the open window there, 
while Tim was equally resolved that he should do 
nothing of the sort. In spite of Don’s superior 
weight, the two boys were fairly equally matched, 
and for a minute or two they strained and 
tussled without advantage to either. Then 
Tim, his arms wrapped around Don’s body 
like iron bands, forced the latter back a step 
and against a chair which went crashing 
to the floor. Don tore at the encircling arms, 
panting. 

“I don’t—want to—hurt you,” he muttered, 
“but—I will—if you don’t—let go!” 

There was no answer from Tim, but the grip 
didn’t relax. Don worked a hand under the 
other’s chin and tried to force his head back. Tim 
gave a little and they collided with the window- 
seat, stumbled and slid together to the floor, Don 
on top. For a moment they writhed and thrashed 
and then Don worked his right arm loose, slowly 


FKIENDS FALL OUT 227 

tore Tim’s left hand away and held it down to 
the floor. 

“Let go or I’ll punch you, Tim,” he panted. 

* ‘ Punch—ahead! ’ ’ 

Don strained until he felt Tim’s other hand 
giving, and then, with a sudden fling of his body, 
rolled clear and jumped to his feet. But Tim was 
only an instant behind him and, panting and 
dishevelled, the two boys confronted each other, 
silent. 

“I’m going out there,” said Don after a mo¬ 
ment. 

Tim only shook his head and smiled crookedly. 

“I am, Tim, and—and you mustn’t try to stop 
me this time! ’ ’ 

“I’ve—got to, Don!” 

“I’m giving you fair warning!’’ 

“I know.” 

Don took a deeper breath and stepped forward. 
“Don’t touch me!” he warned. But Tim was 
once more in his path, hands stretched to clutch 
and hold. “Out of my way, Tim! Fair warn¬ 
ing!” Don’s face was white and his eyes blaz¬ 
ing. 

“No!” whispered Tim, and crouched. 

Then Don went on again. Tim threw himself 
in the way, a fist shot out and Tim, with a grunt, 


228 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


went back against the pillows and slipped heavily 
to the floor. 

Don’s hands fell to his sides and he stared be- 
wilderedly. Then, with a groan, he dropped to his 
knees and raised Tim’s head from the floor. ‘ * Gee, 
but I’m sorry, Timmy! ” he stammered. ‘‘1 didn ’t 
mean to do it, honest! I was crazy, I guess! 
Timmy, are you all right?” 

Tim’s eyes, half-closed, fluttered, he drew a 
deep breath and his head rolled over against Don’s 
arm. 

“Timmy!” cried Don anxiously. “Timmy! 
Don’t you hear me? I didn’t hit you awfully 
hard, Timmy!” 

Tim sighed. “What—time is it?” he mur¬ 
mured. 

“Time? Never mind the time. Are you all 
right, Tim?” 

Tim opened his eyes and grinned weakly. 
“Hear the birdies sing, Don! It was a lovely 
punch! Help me up, will you ? ’ ’ 

Don lifted him to the window-seat. “I’m hor¬ 
ribly sorry, Tim,” he said abjectedly. “I—I 
didn’t know what I was doing, chum! I wish— 
I wish you’d hand me one, Tim! Go on, will 
you?” 

Tim laughed weakly. “It’s all right, Donald. 


FRIENDS FALL OUT 


229 


Just give me a minute to get my breath. Gee, 
things certainly spun around there for a second !” 

i ‘ Where’d I hit you ?’ ’ 

1 ‘Right on the point of the jaw.” Tim felt of 
the place gingerly. “No harm done, though. It 
just sort of—jarred me a bit. What time is it?” 

Don glanced at the tin alarm clock on his 
dresser. i ‘ Ten of seven,’ ’ he answered. ‘‘ What ’s 
that got to do with it?” 

“Well, you can’t make the seven-one now, Don¬ 
ald, unless you fly all the way, can you?” 

“Oh!” said Don, rather blankly. “I—I’d for¬ 
gotten!” 

“Good thing,” muttered Tim. “Wish you’d 
forgotten before! If anyone ever tells you you’re 
a nice good-natured, even-tempered chap, Don, 
don’t you believe him. You send ’em to me!” 

“I didn’t know I could lose my temper like 
that,” replied the other shamefacedly. “Timmy, 
I’m most awfully sorry about it. You believe that, 
don’t you?” 

‘ ‘ Sure! ’ ’ Tim laughed. ‘ 1 But I ’ll bet you ’re not 
half as sorry as you would have been tomorrow 
if I’d let you go! Don, you’re an awful ass, now 
aren’t you?” 

Don nodded. “I guess I am, Timmy. And 
you’re a—a brick, old man!” 


230 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“Huh! Any more trains to New Yprk to¬ 
night!” 

“There’s one at twelve-something,” answered 
Don, with a grin. 

“Thinking of catching it!” 

“Not a hit!” 

“All right then.” Tim dug in his pocket and 
then tossed the door-key beside him on the cush¬ 
ion. “Better unpack your bag, you silly ass. 
Then we’ll go out and get some air. I sort of 
need it!” 

Some three hours later Tim, tossing back his 
bed-clothes, exclaimed: “Hello! What have we 
here?” 

“That’s just a note I wrote you,” said Don hur¬ 
riedly. ‘ ‘ Hand it here, Tim. ’ ’ 

1 ‘ I should say not! I’m going to read it! ” 

“No, please, Tim! It’s just about two or three 
things I was going to leave you! Hand it over, 
like a good chap! ’ ’ 

“Something you were going to leave me?” said 
Tim as he let Don wrest the sheet of paper from 
him. “Oh, I see. Well,”—he felt carefully of the 
lump on his chin—“I guess you left me enough as 
it is, dearie!” 


CHAPTER XX 


AMY APPEARS FOR THE DEFENCE 

Practice on Monday was a wretched affair. To be 
sure, many of the fellows who had played in the 
Chambers game had been excused, but that didn’t 
account for the fact that those who did take part 
went at their work as if half asleep. Both McPhee 
and Cotter failed to get any life into the first, and 
the second, while it, too, seemed to have taken 
part in the general slump, managed to score twice 
while the first was with difficulty wresting three 
touchdowns from its opponent. Mr. Robey 
shouted himself red in the face, Steve Edwards, 
who followed practice, pleaded and exhorted, and 
a stocky, broad-shouldered, bearded individual 
who made his appearance that afternoon for the 
first time frowned and shook his head, and all to 
small purpose. The players accepted scoldings 
and insults as a donkey accepts blows, untroub- 
ledly, apathetically, and jogged on at their own 
pace, guilty of all the sins of commission and omis¬ 
sion in the football decalogue. 

There was much curiosity about the newcomer 
231 


232 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


and many opinions as to his identity were haz¬ 
arded on the bench that afternoon. It was quite 
evident that he was a football authority, for Coach 
Robey consulted him at times all during practice. 
And it was equally evident that they were close 
friends, since the stranger was on one occasion 
seen to smite the head coach most familiarly be¬ 
tween the shoulders! But who he was and what 
he was doing there remained a secret until after 
supper. Then it became known that his name was 
Proctor, Doctor George G. Proctor, that he was a 
practising physician some place in the Middle 
West and that he was visiting Coach Robey. But 
that was unsatisfactory data and some enter¬ 
prising youth hunted back in the football records 
and, lo, the mystery was explained. Eight years 
before “Gus” Proctor had played tackle on the 
Princeton eleven and in his junior and senior 
years had been honoured with a position on the 
All-American Team. Subsequently he had 
coached at a college in Ohio and had put said col¬ 
lege on the map. Now, having stolen away from 
home to see Princeton and Yale play next Satur¬ 
day, he was staying for a day or two with Mr. 
Robey. After that became generally known Doc¬ 
tor Proctor was gazed at with a new respect when¬ 
ever he appeared on field or campus. 


AMY APPEARS FOR DEFENCE 233 


Don and Tim went np to Number 12 that night 
after supper to call on Tom Hall. Tim was having 
hard work making Don face the music. If Don 
could have had his way he would have kept to him¬ 
self, but Tim insisted on dragging him around. 
“Just keep a firm upper lip, Donald,” he coun¬ 
selled, “and show the fellows that there’s nothing 
in it. That’s the only way to do. If you keep 
skulking off by yourself they’ll think you’re 
ashamed.” 

“So I am,” muttered Don. 

“You’re not, either! You’ve done nothing to 
be ashamed of! Keep that in mind, you silly It. 
Now come along and we’ll go up and jolly Tom 
a bit.” 

Steve Edwards was not at home, but Amy Byrd 
was enthroned on the window-seat when they en¬ 
tered in response to Tom’s invitation, and Amy 
had evidently been holding forth very seriously 
on some subject. 

“Don’t mind us,” said Tim. “Go ahead, Amy, 
and get it off your chest. ’ ’ 

“Hello,” said Amy. “Hello, Don, old man. 
Haven’t seen you for an age. Make your¬ 
selves at home. Never mind Tom, he’s only 
the host. How did you like the practice today, 
Tim?” 


234 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“I didn’t see it, but I heard enough about it. 
It must have been fierce!” 

“It was perfectly punk,” growled Tom. “I 
should think Robey would want to throw up his 
hands and quit!’ 9 

“Did you see it, Don?” asked Amy. 

“No, I didn’t go over. What was the trouble?” 

“Well, I’m no expert,” replied Amy, taking his 
knees into his arms and rocking gently back and 
forth on the seat, “but I’d say in my ignorant way 
that someone had unkindly put sleeping-potions in 
the milk at training-table! The only fellow who 
seemed to have his eyes more than half open was 
McPhee. Mac showed signs of life at long inter¬ 
vals. The rest sort of stumbled around in their 
sleep. I think Peters actually snored.” 

‘ ‘ Oh, we ’re going to get a fine old drubbing next 
Saturday,” said Tom pessimistically. “And 
what a fine exhibition for that chap Proctor! I’ll 
bet Robey could have kicked the whole team all 
the way back to the gym. He looked as though 
it would have done him a world of good to have 
a try at it! ” 

“Oh, well, these things happen,” said Tim 
cheerfully. “It’s only a slump. We’ll get 
over it. ’ ’ 

“Slump be blowed!” said Tom. “This is 


AMY APPEARS FOR DEFENCE 235 


a fine time to slump, five days before the 
game!” 

“I know that, too, but there’s no use howling 
about it. What we need, Tom, is to have you get 
back there at right guard, old man.” 

‘ ‘That’s what I’ve been saying,” exclaimed 
Amy earnestly. “I want Tom to go to Josh and 
ask him to let him play, but he won’t. Says it 
wouldn’t be any good. You don’t know whether 
it would or not, Tom, until you try it. Look here, 
Josh doesn’t want us to get beaten Saturday any 
more than we want it ourselves, and if you sort 
of put it up to him like that-” 

“I’d look well, wouldn’t I?” laughed Tom. 
“Telling Josh that unless he let me off pro the 
team would get licked! Gee, that’s some modest, 
isn’t it?” 

“You don’t have to put it like that,” replied 
Amy impatiently. “Be—be diplomatic. Tell 
him-” 

“What we ought to do,” interrupted Tim, “is 
get up a petition and have everyone sign it. ’ ’ 

“I thought of that, too,” said Amy, “but this 
dunder-headed Turk won’t stand for even 
that.” 

“Why not, Tom?” asked Don. 

“Because.” 


236 


LEFT GUABD GILBERT 


“And after that?” asked Amy sweetly. 

4 ‘Well, look here, you chaps.” Tom scowled 
intently for a moment. “Look here. It’s this 
way. Josh put a bunch of us on pro, didn’t he? 
Well, what right have I to go and ask to be let off 
just because I happen to be a football man? You 
don’t suppose those other fellows like it any bet¬ 
ter than I do, do you?” 

“Oh, forget that! I’m one of them, and I’m 
having the time of my life. It’s been the making 
of me, Tom. I’m getting so blamed full of learn¬ 
ing that I ’ll be able to loaf all the rest of the year; 
live on my income, so to say.” And Amy beamed 
proudly. 

“That’s all right,” answered Tom doggedly, 
“but I don’t intend to cry-baby. I’m just as much 
in it as any of you. If Josh wants to let us all 
off, all right, but I’m not going to ask for a—a 
special dispensation!” 

“You don’t need to,” said Tim. “Let the fel¬ 
lows do it. That has nothing to do with you. 
What’s to keep us from going ahead and getting 
up a petition?” 

“Because I ask you not to,” replied Tom sim¬ 
ply. “It’s only fair that we should all be pun¬ 
ished alike.” 

“But you’re not,” said Don. 


AMY APPEARS FOR DEFENCE 237 

“We’re not? Why aren’t we?” asked Tom in 
surprise. 

“Because you’re getting it harder than Amy 
and Harry Westcott and the others,” answered 
Don quietly. “They aren’t barred from any 
sport, and you are.” 

“ By Jove, that’s a fact! ’ ’ exclaimed Amy. 

“But—but we all got the same sentence,” pro¬ 
tested Tom. 

“I know you did, but”—Don smiled—“put it 
like this. I hate parsnips; can’t bear them. Sup¬ 
pose you and I were punished for something we’d 
done by being made to eat parsnips three times a 
day for—for a month! You like them, don’t you? 
Well, who’d get the worst of that? The sentence 
would be the same, but the—the punishment would 
be a heap worse for me, wouldn’t it?” 

“ ‘Father was right’!” said Tim. 

“Oh, father never spoke a truer word!” cried 
Amy, jumping up from the window-seat. “That 
settles it, Tom! Get some paper, Tim, and we’ll 
write that petition this minute and I’ll guarantee 
to get fifty signatures before ten o’clock!” 

“You’ll do nothing of the sort,” said Tom stub¬ 
bornly. “Don talks like a lawyer, all right, but 
he’s all wrong. And, anyway, I’m out of football 
and I’m going to stay out for this year. I’ve quit 


238 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


training and I probably couldn’t play if Josh said 
I might. So that-” 

“Oh, piffle,” said Amy. “Quit training! 
Everyone knows you never quit training, Tom. 
You could go out there tomorrow and play as 
good a game as you ever did. Don’t talk like a 
sick duck!” 

1 < There > s no reason why I should play, though. 
Pryme’s putting up a bully game-” 

“Pryme is doing the best he knows how,” said 
Tim, “but Pryme can’t play guard as you can, 
Tom, and he never will, and you know it! Now 
have a grain of sense, won’t you? Just sit tight 
and let us put this thing through. There isn’t a 
fellow in school who won’t be tickled to death to 
sign that petition, and I’ll bet you anything you 
like that Josh will be just as tickled to say yes to 
it. Whatever you say about Josh Fernald, you’ve 
got to hand it to him for being fair and square, 
Tom.” 

6 ‘Josh is all right, sure. I haven’t said anything 
against him, have I? But I won’t stand for any 
petition, fellows, so you might as well get that out 
of your heads. Besides, my being on the team or 
off it isn’t going to make a half of one per cent’s 
difference next Saturday.” 

There was silence in the room for a moment. 



AMY APPEARS FOR DEFENCE 239 


Then Amy went dejectedly back to the window- 
seat and threw himself on it at full length. “I 
think yon might, Tom,” he said finally, “if only on 
my account!” 

“Why on yonr account?” laughed Tom. 

“Because I’m the guy that got you all into the 
mess, that’s why. And I’ve felt good and mean 
about it ever since. And now, when we think up a 
perfectly good way to—to undo the mischief I 
made, you act like a mule. Think what a relief it 
would be to my conscience, Tom, if you got off pro 
and went back and played against Claflin! ’ ’ 

“I don’t care a continental about your con¬ 
science, Amy. In fact I never knew before that 
you had one!” 

“I’ve got a very nice one, thanks. It’s well- 

trained, too. It-” Amy’s voice trailed off into 

silence and for the next five minutes or so he took 
no part in the conversation, but just laid on the 
cushions and stared intently at the ceiling. Then, 
suddenly, he thumped his feet to the floor and 
reached for his cap. 

“What time is it?” he demanded. 

“ Most eight,” said Tim. “We’d better 
beat it.” 

“What time-” began Amy. Then he 

stopped, pulled his cap on his head and literally 



240 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


hurled himself across the room and through the 
door, leaving the others to gaze at each other 
amazedly. 

“Well, what’s wrong with him?” gasped Tim. 

“He’s got something in that crazy head of his,” 
answered Tom uneasily. 4 4 Don’t let him start that 
petition business, Tim, will you? I don’t want to 
seem mean or anything, you know, but I’d rather 
let things be as they are. Come up again, fellows. 
And maybe today’s showing doesn’t mean any¬ 
thing, Tim, just as you said. We’ll hope so, eh?” 

Faculty conferences took place on Monday 
evenings at half-past seven in the faculty meeting 
room in Main Hall. At such times, with the prin¬ 
cipal, Mr. Fernald, presiding at the end of the 
long table and all members of the faculty able to 
attend ranged on either side, all and sundry mat¬ 
ters pertaining to the government of the school 
came up for discussion. The business portion of 
the conference was followed by an informal half- 
hour of talk, during which many of the students 
were subjected to a dissection that would have 
surprised them vastly had they known of it. To¬ 
night, however, the executive session was still 
going on and Mr. Brooke, the secretary, was still 
making notes at the foot of the table, when there 
came a rap at the door. 


AMY APPEARS FOR DEFENCE 241 


Mr. Fernald nodded to Mr. Brooke. “See who 
it is, please,” he said. 

The secretary laid down his pen very carefully 
on the clean square of blue blotting-paper before 
him, pushed back his chair and opened the door a 
few inches. When he turned around his counte¬ 
nance expressed a sort of pained disapprobation. 
“It’s Byrd, sir,” announced Mr. Brooke in a low, 
shocked voice. “He says he’d like to speak to 
you.” 

“Byrd? Well, tell him Pm busy,” replied the 
principal. “If he wants to wait I’ll see him after 
the conference. Although”—Mr. Fernald glanced 
at the clock—“it’s only four minutes to eight and 
he’d better get back to his room. Tell him I’ll 
see him at the Cottage at nine, Mr. Brooke. As I 
was saying,” and Mr. Fernald faced the company 
again, “I think it would be well to arrange for a 
longer course this Winter. Last year, as you’ll 
recall- Eh ? What is it ? ” 

“He says, sir, that it’s a faculty matter,” an¬ 
nounced Mr. Brooke deprecatingly, “and asks to 
be allowed to come in for a minute.” 

“A faculty matter? Well, in that case- 

All right, Mr. Brooke, tell him to come in.” 

As Amy entered eight pairs of eyes regarded 
him curiously; nine, in fact, for Mr. Brooke, clos- 



242 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


ing the door softly behind the visitor, gazed at him 
in questioning disapproval. 

“Well, Byrd, what can we do for you?” Mr. 
Fernald smiled, doubtless with the wish to dispel 
embarrassment. But he needn’t have troubled 
about that, for Amy didn’t look or act in the least 
embarrassed. “I’m afraid,” continued the prin¬ 
cipal, “that I can’t offer you a chair, for we’re 
rather busy just now. What was it you wanted to 
speak of?” 

“I guess it looks pretty cheeky, sir, for me to 
butt in here,” replied Amy, with a smile, “but it’s 
rather important, sir, and—and if anything’s to 
be done about it it’ll have to be done tonight.” 

“Really? Well, it does sound important. Sup¬ 
pose you tell us about it, Byrd.” 

‘ ‘ Thank you, sir. ’ ’ Amy paused, gathering his 
words in order. “It’s this, Mr. Fernald: when 
we fellows were put on pro—probation, I mean, it 
was intended that we should all get the same pun¬ 
ishment, wasn’t it, sir?” 

‘ ‘ Let me see, that was the affair of- Ah, yes, 

I recall it. Why, yes, Byrd, naturally it was meant 
to treat you all alike. What complaint have 
you?” 

“It isn’t exactly a complaint, sir. But it’s this 
way. There were nine of us altogether. It was 


AMY APPEARS FOR DEFENCE 243 


my fault in the first place because I put them up to 
it. They’d never thought of it if I hadn ’t.’ ’ Amy 
glanced at Mr. Moller. 11 It was a pretty silly piece 
of business, sir, and we got what we deserved. 
But—but none of us meant to—to hurt anyone’s 
feelings, sir. It was just a lark. We didn’t think 
that-” 

“We’ll allow that, Byrd. Please get down to 
the purpose of this unusual visit,” said Mr. 
Fernald drily. 

“Yes, sir. Well, eight of us it doesn’t matter 
so much about. We aren’t football men and being 
on probation doesn’t cut so much—I mean it 
doesn’t matter so much. But Tom Hall’s a foot¬ 
ball man, sir, and it’s different for him. This is 
his last year here and losing his place on the team 
was hard lines. That’s what I’m trying to get at, 
sir. You meant that we were all to be punished 
the same, but we weren’t. It’s just about twice 
as hard on Tom as it is on the rest of us. You see 
that, sir, don’t you?” 

There was a moment of silence and then Mr. 
Simkins coughed. Or did he chuckle? Amy 
couldn’t tell. But the principal dropped his eyes 
and tapped his blotter with the tip of the pencil he 
held. At last: 

“That’s a novel point of view, Byrd,” he said. 


244 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“ There may be something in it. But I must re¬ 
mind you that the Law—and the faculty stands for 
the Law here—takes no cognisance of conditions 
existing—hem!” Mr. Fernald glanced doubtfully 
down the table. 1 ‘Perhaps it should, though. 
We’ll pass that question for the moment. What 
is it you suggest, Byrd?” 

“Well, sir, the team’s in punk shape. It was 
awful today. It needs Tom, sir; needs him 
awfully. I don’t say that we’ll beat Claflin if he 
should play, Mr. Fernald, but I’m mighty sure we 
won’t if he doesn’t. And it seemed to me that 
maybe you and the other faculty members hadn’t 
thought of how much harder you were giving it to 
Tom than to the rest of us, and that if you did 
know, realise it, sir, you’d maybe consider that 
he’d had about enough and let him off so he 
might play Saturday. The rest of us haven’t any 
kick coming, sir. It’s just Tom. And he doesn’t 
know that I’m here, either. We tried to get him 
to let us petition faculty, but he wouldn’t. He said 
he was going to take the same punishment as the 
rest of us.” 

“Then he doesn’t agree with your contention, 
Byrd?” 

“Oh, he sees I’m right, Mr. Fernald, but he— 
he’s obstinate!” 


AMY APPEARS FOR DEFENCE 245 


Mr. Fernald smiled, as did most of the others. 

“Byrd, I think yon ought to take a law course/’ 
said the principal. “I might answer you as I 
started to by pointing out that it is no business of 
ours whether a punishment is going to hit one fel¬ 
low harder than another; that just because it 
might should make that one fellow more careful 
not to transgress. But you’ve taken the wind out 
of my sails by getting me to testify that we in¬ 
tended the punishment to be the same for all. 
You’ve put us in a difficult place, Byrd. If we 
should lift probation in Hall’s case it would seem 
that we had different laws for team members than 
for boys unconnected with athletics. You’ve made 

a very eloquent plea, but I don’t just see-” 

Mr. Fernald hesitated. Then: “Possibly someone 
has some suggestion,” he added, and it seemed to 
Amy that his gaze rested on Mr. Moller for an 
instant. 

At all events it was the new member of the fac¬ 
ulty who spoke. “If I might, sir,” he said hesi¬ 
tatingly, “I’d like to make the suggestion that 
probation be lifted from all. It seems to me that 
that would—would simplify things, Mr. Fernald.” 

“Hm. Yes. Possibly. As the target of the 
extremely vulgar proceeding, Mr. Moller, the sug¬ 
gestion coming from you bears weight. Byrd, 



246 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


you’d better get to your studies. You’ll learn our 
decision in the morning. Your action is com¬ 
mendable, my boy, and we’ll take that into con¬ 
sideration also. Good-night. ’ ’ 

“ Good-night, sir. Good-night, sirs. Thank 
you. ’ ’ 

Amy retired unhurriedly, unembarrassedly, and 
with dignity, as^efitted one who had opened the 
eyes of Authority to the error of its ways! 

The next morning Mr. Fernald announced in 
chapel that at the request of Mr. Moller, and in 
consideration of good behaviour, the faculty had 
voted to lift probation from the following stu¬ 
dents : Hall- 

But just there the applause began and the other 
eight names were not heard. 


CHAPTER XXI 


THE DOCTOR TELLS A STORY 

Tuesday, with the return of all first-string players 
to the line-up and the appearance of Tom Hall 
once more at right guard, practice went about a 
hundred per cent better, and those who turned 
out to watch it went back to the campus consid¬ 
erably encouraged. The showing of the team 
naturally had an effect on the spirit of the mass 
meeting that evening. Ever since the Southby 
game the school had been holding meetings and 
“getting up steam” for the Claflin contest, but 
they had been tame affairs in contrast with to¬ 
nights. Brimfield was football-crazy now, for 
the Big Game loomed enormous but four days 
away. Fellows read football in the papers, talked 
football and, some of them, dreamed football. 
The news from Claflin was read and discussed 
eagerly. The fortunes of the rival eleven were 
watched just as closely as those of the home team. 
When a Claflin player wrenched an ankle Brim- 
field gasped excitedly. When it was published 
that Cox, of the blue team, had dropped fourteen 
247 


248 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


goals out of twenty tries from the thirty-five-yard 
line and at a severe angle, depression prevailed at 
Brimfield. The news that the Claflin scrubs had 
held the first to only one touchdown in thirty min¬ 
utes of play sent Brimfield*s spirits soaring! Fel¬ 
lows neglected lessons brazenly and during that 
week of the final battle there was a scholastic 
slump that would undoubtedly have greatly 
alarmed the faculty if the latter, rendered wise by 
experience, hadn’t expected it. 

The first team players were excused from study 
hour subsequent to Monday in order that they 
might attend blackboard lectures and signal drills 
in the gymnasium. On Tuesday night, after an 
hour’s session, and in response to public clamour, 
they filed onto the platform just before the meet¬ 
ing was to begin at nine-fifteen and, somewhat 
embarrassedly, seated themselves in the chairs 
arranged across the back. Mr. Fernald was there, 
and Mr. Conklin, the athletic director, and 
Coaches Robey and Boutelle, and Trainer Danny 
Moore, and Manager Morton and Childers, cap¬ 
tain of the baseball team. And Steve Payne was 
at the piano. Also, sitting beside Mr. Robey, was 
Doctor Proctor. 

Childers, who was cheer leader that Fall, pre¬ 
sided, and, after the assemblage had clapped and 


THE DOCTOR TELLS A STORY 249 


shouted “A-a-ay!” as each newcomer appeared 
on the platform, opened proceedings with the 
School Song. Then Mr. Fernald spoke briefly, 
Captain Edwards followed, each being cheered 
loudly and long, and Childers introduced Mr. 
Robey. “What we are all anxious to know to¬ 
night/ ’ said Childers, “is whether we’re going 
to win next Saturday. Mr. Fernald has said that 
he hopes we shall, Captain Edwards has said that 
he thinks we shall, and now we’re going to hear 
from the only one who knows! Fellows, a long 
cheer for Mr. Robey, and make it good! Are you 
all ready ? Now then! One—two—three!’ 9 
“Brimfield! Brimfield! Brimfield! Rah, rah, 
rah! Rah, rah, rah! Rah, rah, rah! Brimfield! 
Brimfield! Brimfield! Robey! ’ 9 
When the cheering, and the shouting and clap¬ 
ping and stamping that followed for good meas¬ 
ure, had quieted down, Mr. Robey said: “Fellows, 
Captain Childers is much too flattering. I’m not 
gifted with second-sight, even if he thinks so. I 
don’t know any more than he does or you do 
whether we’re going to win on Saturday. Like 
Mr. Fernald, I hope we are and, like Captain Ed¬ 
wards, I think we are.” Cheers interrupted then. 
“But I don’t want to make any prediction. I’ll 
say one thing, though, and that is this: If the 


250 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


team plays the way it can play, if it makes full 
use of the ability that’s in it, there’s only one 
thing that can happen, and that’s a Brimfield vic¬ 
tory! I’ve got every reason to expect that the 
team will do its utmost, and that is why I say that 
I think we’ll win. We must remember that we’re 
going up against a strong team, a team that in 
some ways has shown itself so far this season our 
superior. I don’t say that the Claflin eleven is 
any better than ours. I don’t think so, not for a 
moment. Our team this Fall is as good as last 
year’s team. We’ve had our little upsets; we 
always do; but we’ve come down to practically the 
eve of the game in good shape. Every fellow has 
done his best and, I am firmly convinced, is going 
to do a little better than his best on Saturday 
afternoon. And that little better is what will de¬ 
cide the game, fellows. After the coaches have 
done their part and the players have toiled hard 
and earnestly and enthusiastically, why then it 
all comes down to fight! And so it’s fight that’s 
going to win the game. 

6 ‘You fellows must do your part, though. You 
must be right back of the team, every minute— 
and let them know it. Cheering helps a team to 
win, no matter what anyone may say to the con¬ 
trary. Only cheer at the right times, fellow r s. 


THE DOCTOR TELLS A STORY 251 


Just making a noise indiscriminately is poor stuff. 
But I don’t need to tell you this, I guess, because 
your cheer leader knows what to do better than I 
do. But let the team know that you’re right with 
them, backing them up all the time, fighting be¬ 
hind them, boosting them along! It counts, fel¬ 
lows, take my word for it! 

“ And now there’s one other thing I want to say 
before I make way for someone who can really 
talk. It’s this, fellows. Don’t forget the team 
that has helped us all season, the team that 
doesn’t get into the limelight. And don’t forget 
the coach, who has worked just as hard, perhaps 
a good deal harder, to develop that team than I’ve 
worked. I’m going to ask you to show your ap¬ 
preciation of the unselfish devotion of Coach 
Boutelle and one of the finest second teams Brim- 
field has ever had!” 

Mr. Robey bowed and retreated and Childers 
jumped to his feet. 

“A cheer for Coach Boutelle, fellows!” he 
shouted. “A long cheer and a whopper!” And, 
when it had been given lustily: “And now one 
for the second team!” he cried. “Everyone into 
it! One—two—three!” The enthusiasm was 
mounting high now, and, after the cheer had died 
away, there were demands for a song. “We want 


252 LEFT GUARD GILBERT 

to sing!” proclaimed the meeting. “We want to 
sing!” 

Childers held up a hand. “All right, fellows! 
Just a minute, please! We’ve got a guest with us 
this evening, an honoured guest, fellows. Those 
of you who know football history know his name 
as well as you know the names of Heffelfinger and 
DeWitt and Coy and Brickley and—and many 
others in the Football Hall of Fame! I know you 
want to hear from him and I hope he will he will¬ 
ing to say a few words. ’ ’ Childers glanced at Doc¬ 
tor Proctor and the latter, smiling, shook his head 
energetically. “He says he will be glad to, fel¬ 
lows,” continued Childers mendaciously, amidst 
laughter, “and so I’m going to call first for a cheer 
for—if the gentleman will pardon me—‘Gus’ 
Proctor, famous Princeton and All-America 
tackle, and after that we’re going to listen very 
attentively to him. Now, then, everyone into this! 
A long cheer for Doctor Proctor!” 

“I’m an awfully poor speaker, fellows,” began 
the doctor, when he had advanced to the front of 
the platform. “I appreciate this honour and if I 
don’t do justice to the fine reputation your—your 
imaginative cheer leader has provided me with 
you must try to forgive me. Speaking isn’t my 
line. If any of you would like to have a leg sawed 


THE DOCTOR TELLS A STORY 253 


off or something of that sort I’d he glad to do it 
free of charge just to prove that—well, that 
there’s something I can do fairly decently! 

“I saw your team practice yesterday and I 
thought then that perhaps an operation would 
benefit it. Then I saw it again today and discov¬ 
ered that my first diagnosis was wrong. Fellows, 
I call it a good team. I think you’ve got material 
there that’s equal to any I’ve ever seen on a school 
team. Your coach says he won’t prophesy as to 
your game on Saturday. I’ve known George 
Robey for ten years. He isn’t a had sort, take him 
all around, but he’s a pessimist of the most pessi¬ 
mistic sort. He’s the kind of chap who, if you 
sprang that old reliable one on him about every 
cloud having a silver lining, would shrug his 
shoulders and say, ‘ Humph! More likely nickel- 
plated!’ That’s the sort he is, boys. Now I’m 
just the opposite, and, at the risk of displeasing 
George, I’m going to tell you that, from what I’ve 
seen of the Brimfield football team in practice, 
I’m firmly convinced that it’s going to win!” 

Loud and prolonged cheering greeted that pre¬ 
diction, and it was fully a minute before the 
speaker could proceed. 

“I’ve played the game in my day and I’ve 
coached teams, boys, and I think I’ve got a little 


254 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


of what your coach disclaimed. I mean a sort of 
—well, not second-sight, but a sort of ability to 
tell what a team will do from the looks of the 
players on it. In my profession we have to study 
human nature a lot and we get so we can classify 
folks after we’ve looked them over and watched 
them awhile. We make mistakes sometimes, but 
on the whole we manage fairly well to put folks 
in the classes they belong in. Doing that with 
the members of your team I find that almost with¬ 
out exception they class with the kind of fellows 
who don’t like to be beaten! And when a fellow 
doesn’t like to be beaten he isn’t—not very often. 

“I think I can read in the faces I see here to¬ 
night a great deal of that same spirit, and if the 
team has it and you fellows behind the team have 
it, why, I wouldn’t give a last year’s plug-hat for 
Claflin’s chances next Saturday! 

“Football,” continued Doctor Proctor pres¬ 
ently, “is a fine game. It’s fun to play and it’s a 
wonderful thing to train a fellow’s body and mind. 
I’ve heard lots of folks object to it on various 
scores, but I’ve never heard an objection yet that 
carried any weight. More often than not those 
who run football down don’t know the game. Why, 
if it did no more than teach us obedience and 
discipline it would be worth while. But it does 


THE DOCTOR TELLS A STORY 255 


far more than that. It gives us strong, depend¬ 
able bodies, it teaches us to think—and think 
quick, and it gives us courage, physical and moral. 
I’m going to tell you of an incident that I wit¬ 
nessed only a few weeks since if you’ll let me. I 
fear I’m taking up too much time-” 

There were cries of “No, no!” and “Go 
ahead!” 

“I’ll try to be brief. Last Fall I was travelling 
on a train out my way, to be exact some eighty 
miles west of Cincinnati, when we had an acci¬ 
dent. A freight train was slow about taking a 
side track and we came along and banged into it. 
It was about five o ’clock in the morning and most 
of the passengers were asleep. A wreck’s a nasty 
thing in any case, but when it happens at night or 
before it is light enough to see it is worse. The 
forward cars of our train and the freight caught 
fire from the engines, and there was a good deal 
of loose steam around, and things were pretty 
messy for awhile. There happened to be another 
doctor on the train and, as soon as we got our 
bearings, we started a first-aid camp alongside the 
track. Some of the passengers, mostly in the day 
coaches up front, were badly burned and we had 
our hands full. 

“There is always more or less confusion in an 



256 LEFT GUARD GILBERT 

affair of that sort and it was some minutes after 
the accident before the rescue work got under way. 
But one of the first rescuers I noticed was a young 
chap, a boy in fact, probably about seventeen 
years old. He didn’t have a great deal on, I re¬ 
member, but he was certainly Johnny-on-the-spot 
that morning! It was he who brought the first pa¬ 
tient to me, a little dried-up Hebrew peddler I 
judged him, who had been caught under some 
wreckage in the forward day-coach. He had a 
broken forearm and while I was busy with him I 
saw this young chap climbing in and out of win¬ 
dows and wading through wreckage and always 
coming out again with someone. How many folks 
he pulled away from the flames and the scalding 
steam I don’t know, but I never saw anyone work 
harder or more—more efficiently. Yes, efficiently 
is just the word I want! And I said to myself at 
the time: ‘That fellow is a football man! And 
I’ll bet he’s a good one!’ You see, it wasn’t only 
that he had courage to risk himself, but he had the 
ability to see what was to be done and to do it, 
and do it quick! Why, he was pulling injured 
women and children and men from those burning, 
overturned cars before a grown-up man had 
sensed what had happened! And later on, when 
we’d done what we could for the burned and 


THE DOCTOR TELLS A STORY 257 


scalded bodies and limbs, I got hold of the boy for 
a moment. I asked him his name and he told it, 
and then I said: ‘You’ve played football, haven’t 
you?’ And he said he had, a little. He wasn’t 
much of a talker, and when some of us said some 
nice things about what he had done he got hor¬ 
ribly fussed and tried to get away. But someone 
wanted to shake hands with him, and he wouldn’t, 
and I saw that his own hand was burned all in¬ 
side the palm, deep and nasty. ‘How did you do 
that!’ I asked him as I dressed it. Oh, he didn’t 
know. He thought he’d got his hand caught be¬ 
tween some beams or something; couldn’t get it 
out for a minute. It wasn’t much of a burn! Well, 
the wrecking train and a hospital train came along 
about then and I lost sight of that chap, and I 
didn’t see him again. 

“I’ve told the story because I think it bears me 
out when I say that football is fine training. I 
don’t say that that boy wouldn’t have been just as 
brave and eager to help if he hadn’t been a foot¬ 
ball player, but I do maintain that he wouldn’t 
have known what to do as readily or how to do it 
and wouldn’t have got at it as quickly. And when 
the flames are eating their way back from car to 
car quickness means a whole lot! That’s the end 
of my story, boys. But while I’ve been telling it 


258 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


I’ve been looking for some sign to tell me that 
you recognised the hero of it. I don’t find the 
sign and I’m puzzled. Perhaps you’re so accus¬ 
tomed to heroes here at Brimfield that one more 
or less doesn’t stir you. For the satisfaction of 
my own curiosity I’m going to ask you if you 
know who I’ve been talking about.” 

A deep silence was the only answer. The doc¬ 
tor’s audience looked extremely interested and 
curious, but no one spoke. 

“I see. You don’t know. Well, perhaps I’d 
better not tell then.” But a chorus of protest 
arose. The doctor hesitated, and his gaze seemed 
to rest intently on a spot at one side of the hall 
and about half-way back. Finally, when silence 
had fallen again: “I guess I will tell,” he said. 
“It can’t do him or you any harm. It may help 
a little to know that there’s one amongst you fine 
enough to do what I’ve described. I’ve never 
seen that boy from the moment the wrecking train 
reached the scene of the wreck until tonight, and 
so I’ve never spoken to him again. But as I sat 
on the platform here awhile ago I looked and saw 
him. I don’t forget faces very easily, and as you 
can understand, I wasn’t likely to forget his. As 
I say, I haven’t spoken to him yet, but I’m going 
to now.” 


THE DOCTOR TELLS A STORY 259 


There was a silence in which a dropped pin 
would have made a noise like a crowbar. Half the 
audience had turned their heads in the direction 
of Doctor Proctor’s smiling gaze, hut all eyes were 
fixed on his lips. The breathless silence length¬ 
ened. Then the doctor spoke. 

“How is your hand, Gilbert V 9 he asked. 


CHAPTER XXII 


COACH ROBEY IS PUZZLED 

Some twenty minutes later Don dropped into a 
chair in Number 6 and heaved a deep sigh of 
relief. “Gee,” he muttered, “I wouldn’t go 
through that again for—for a million dollars!” 

Tim chuckled as he seated himself beyond the 
table. “Why not?” he asked innocently. “I 
thought everyone treated you very nicely. ’ 9 

A smile flitted across Don’s face. “I suppose 
they did, only—I guess that was the trouble! I 
felt like an awful fool, Tim! Look here, what did 
he have to go and tell everything he knew for? I 
was afraid he was going to and I wanted like any¬ 
thing to sneak out of there, but the place was so 
quiet I didn’t have the nerve! At first I didn’t 
suspect that he had seen me. I didn’t recognise 
him until he stood up to speak this evening. Yes¬ 
terday I thought he looked sort of familiar, but I 
couldn’t place him. He—he talks too much!” 

“He said some awfully nice things about you, 
old man.” 

“He said a lot of nonsense, too! Exaggerated 
260 


COACH ROBEY IS PUZZLED 261 


the whole thing, he did. Why, to listen to him 
you’d think I saved about a thousand people from 
certain death! Well, I didn’t. I helped about six 
or seven folks out of those cars. They were sort 
of rattled and didn’t seem to know enough to 
beat it.” 

“They weren’t in any danger, then?” 

“No, not much. All they had to do was crawl 
out of the way. ’ ’ 

“Then they weren’t any of them burned, Don?” 

“A few were.” 

‘ 4 How about the man with the broken arm ? ’ ’ 

“Oh, he’d got caught somehow.” Don looked 
up and saw Tim’s laugh. “Well,” he added de¬ 
fensively, “he needn’t have told about it like that, 
right out in front of the whole school, need 
he?” 

“You bet he need! Donald, you’re a bloomin’, 
blushin’ hero, and we’re proud of you! And when 
I say blushing I mean it, for you haven’t stopped 
yet!” 

“I guess you’d blush,” growled Don, “if it hap¬ 
pened to you! ’ ’ 

“I dare say, but it never will. I’ll never have 
the whole school get up on their feet and cheer me 
like mad for three solid minutes! And I’ll never 
have Josh shake my hand off and beam at me and 


262 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


tell me Pm a credit to the school! Such beautiful 
things are not for poor little Tim!” 

Don sighed. “Well, it’s over with, anyway.” 

“Over with, nothing! It won’t be over with as 
long as you stay here, Donald. A hero you are and 
a hero you remain, old chap. And—and I’m 
mighty proud of you, you old humbug! Telling 
us you didn’t do anything but help lug folks to the 
relief train, or something!” 

“I didn’t say that,” replied Don defensively. 

“You let us think it. Gee, if I’d done anything 
like that I’d have put it in the papers!” Tim 
chuckled and then went on seriously. “You don’t 
need to worry about the fellows thinking you a 
quitter any more, do you ? I guess Proctor settled 
that once and for all, Don. And suppose you’d 
run away home the other night. This wouldn’t 
have happened and fellows would have said you 
had a yellow streak. I guulss it was a mighty 
lucky thing you have little Tim to look after you, 
dearie! ’ ’ 

“I’m glad I didn’t,” said Don earnestly. “I’d 
have made a worse mess of it, shouldn’t I ? I—I’m 
sorry you got that punch, though, Timmy. ’ ’ 

“Forget it! It was worth it! Being the room¬ 
mate of a hero atones for everything you ever did 
to me, Donald. I’m that proud ’’ 


COACH ROBEY IS PUZZLED 263 


But Tim didn’t finish, for Don started around 
the table for him. 

At the time this conversation was taking place 
Mr. Robey and Doctor Proctor were walking back 
to the former’s room in the village through a 
frosty, starlit night. 

“You certainly managed to spring a sensation, 
Gus,” observed the coach as they turned into the 
road. 

“I should say so! Well, that boy deserved all 
the cheering and praise he received. And I’m 
glad I told that story.” 

“Well, it’s got me guessing,” responded the 
other. 1 ‘ Look here, Gus, take a chap like the one 
you described tonight. What would you think if 
he quit cold a week before the big game?” 

‘ ‘ Quit ? How do ,you mean, George ? ’ ’ 

“Just that. Develops an imaginary illness. 
Tells you he doesn’t feel well enough to play, in 
spite of the fact that he has nothing more the 
matter with him than you or I have. Probably 
not so much. Shows absolute relief when you tell 
him he’s dropped. What would you say to that?” 

“You mean Gilbert did that?” Mr. Robey as¬ 
sented. “I wondered why he wasn’t on the plat¬ 
form with the rest of the team,” mused the doc- 


264 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


tor. “I’d say there was something queer about 
it, George. When did this happen ?’ 7 

“Last week. Thursday or Friday, I think. 
He’d been laid off for a day or so and I thought 
he’d gone a bit fine, although he’s rather too 
phlegmatic to suffer much from nerves. Some of 
the high-strung chaps do go to pieces about this 
time and you have to nurse them along pretty 
carefully. But Gilbert! Well, on Saturday—yes, 
that was the day—he’d been reported perfectly 
fit by the trainer and just as a matter of form I 
asked him if he was ready to play. And, by 
Jove, he had the cheek to face me and say he 
wasn’t well enough! It was nonsense, of course. 
He’d simply got scared. I told him so and 
dropped him. But it’s curious that a boy who 
could do what you told of this evening could prove 
a quitter like that. ’ ’ 

“You say he seemed relieved when you let 
him goV 7 

“Yes, he showed it plainly.” 

“That is funny! I wonder what the truth of 
it is?” 

“Nerves, I suppose. Cold feet, as the fellows 
say.” 

“Never! There’s something else, old man, that 
you haven’t got hold of. Can he play?” 


COACH ROBEY IS PUZZLED 265 


“ Y-yes. Yes, he can play. He’s the sort that 
comes slow and plays a bit logy, but he’s steady 
and works hard. Not a brilliant man, you know, 
but dependable. He’s been playing guard. 
Losing him has left us a bit weak on that side, 
too.” 

“Why not take him back then? Look here, 
George, you’re a good coach and all that, hut 
you’re a mighty poor judge of human nature.” 

“Piffle!” 

“It’s so, though. You’ve only got to study that 
chap Gilbert to see that he isn’t the quitting kind. 
His looks show it, his manner shows it, the way 
he talks shows it. He’s the sort that might want 
to quit; we all do sometimes; but he couldn’t be¬ 
cause he’s got stuff in him that wouldn’t let him!” 

“That’s all well enough, Gus, but facts are 
facts. Gilbert did quit, and quit cold on me. So 
theories don’t count for much. And this human 
nature flapdoodle-” 

“I don’t say he didn’t quit. But I do say that 
you’ve made the wrong diagnosis, George. Did 
you talk to him? Ask him what the trouble was? 
Go after the symptoms?” 

“No, I’m no physician. He said he wasn’t feel¬ 
ing well enough to play. I told him we had no 
place for quitters on the team. He had nothing 



266 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


to say to that. If you think I can feel the pulse 
and look at the tongue of every fellow-” 

Doctor Proctor laughed. “And take his tem¬ 
perature too, ehf No, I don’t expect you to do 
that, George. But I’ll tell you what I would do, 
and I’d do it tomorrow too. I’d call around and 
see Gilbert. I’d tell him that I wasn’t satisfied 
with the explanation he’d made and I’d ask him 
to make a clean breast of the trouble, for he must 
be in some trouble or he wouldn’t thank you for 
firing him. And then I’d stop cutting off my nose 
to spite my face and I’d reinstate him tomorrow 
afternoon! ’ ’ 

“Hmph! The trouble with you doctors is that 
you’re too romantic. You imagine things, 
you-” 

“We have to imagine, George. If we stuck to 
facts we’d never get anywhere in our profes¬ 
sion! You try a little imagination, old chap. 
You’re too matter-of-fact. What you can’t see 
you won’t believe in.” 

“I certainly won’t! As the kids say, seeing’s 
believing. ’ ’ 

“Well, there’s a very unattractive board fence 
across the road, George. On the other side of it 
there are shrubs and grass. I can’t see them, but 
I know they’re there.” 


COACH ROBEY IS PUZZLED 267 

“More likely tin-cans and ashes,” grunted Mr. 
Robey. 

“Pessimist!” laughed the other. “But never 
mind; ashes or grass, something’s there, and you 
can’t see it and yet you’ve got to acknowledge the 
existence of it. Now haven’t you ? ’ ’ 

“I suppose so, but”—Mr. Robey laughed—“I’d 
rather see it!” 

“Climb the fence and have a look then! But 
you’ll try my plan with the boy, won’t you?” 

“Yes, I will. If only to satisfy my curiosity, 
Gus. Hang it, the chap can’t be a quitter!” 

“He isn’t. I’ll stake my reputation as—as a 
romanticist on that! I’d like mighty well to stay 
and solve the mystery with you, but I’ll have to 
jump for that early train. I wish, though, that 
you’d drop me a line and tell me the outcome. 
I’m interested—and puzzled.” 

“All right. I’m not much of a letter-writer, 
though. I’ll see you before you go back and tell 
you about it. You’ll be in New York on Sunday, 
won’t you?” 

“Until two o’clock. Have lunch with me and 
see me off. Come to the hotel as early as you can 
and we’ll hold post-mortems on the games. Let’s 
hope that Princeton and Brimfield both win next 
Saturday, George!” 


CHAPTER XXHI 


CROSS-EXAMINATION 

Don found being a hero an embarrassing business 
the next day. The masters bothered him by stop¬ 
ping and shaking hands and saying nice things, 
and the fellows beamed on him if they weren’t 
well enough acquainted to speak and insisted on 
having a full and detailed history of that train- 
wreck if they were! Of course they all, masters 
and students, meant well and wanted to show 
their admiration, but Don wished they wouldn’t. 
It made him feel horribly self-conscious, and, 
feeling self-conscious was distinctly uncomforta¬ 
ble. At breakfast table his companions referred 
to last evening’s incident laughingly and poked 
fun at Don and enjoyed his embarrassment, but 
it wasn’t difficult to tell that Doctor Proctor’s 
narrative had made a strong impression on them 
and increased their liking for Don. When, just 
before Don had finished his meal, Mr. Robey left 
the training-table and crossed the room toward 
him he braced himself for another scene in which 
he would have to stand up and be shaken by the 
268 


CROSS-EXAMINATION 


269 


hand, and possibly, and worst of all, listen to some 
sort of an apology from the coach. But Don was 
spared, for Mr. Robey only placed a hand on the 
back of his chair, included the rest of the occupants 
of the table in his ‘ ‘ Good-morning, ’’ and said 
carelessly: “Gilbert, I wish you’d drop over to 
Mr. Conklin’s office some time this morning and 
see me. What time can you come?” 

‘ ‘ Half-past ten, sir ? ” 

“That will be all right, thanks.” 

The coach returned to his table, leaving Don 
wondering what was up. Possibly, he thought, 
the coach wanted to make some sort of retraction 
of his accusation of Saturday, although Don 
didn’t believe that Mr. Robey was the sort to funk 
a public apology. If it wasn’t that it could only 
be that he was to be offered his place on the team 
again. Don sighed. That would be beastly, for 
he would have to tell more fibs, and brand new 
ones, too, since not even a blind man would believe 
him ill now! It was something of a coincidence 
that Don should run across Walton in the corridor 
a few minutes later. Don was for passing by 
with no recognition of the other, but Walton, with 
a smirk, placed himself fairly in the way. 

“Great stuff, Gilbert,” he said with an at¬ 
tempted heartiness. “Some hero, eh, what?” 


270 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


‘‘Drop it, Walton!” Don lowered his voice, 
for others were passing toward the doorway. 
1 ‘And Ill thank you not to speak to me. You 
know my opinion of you. Now shut up!” 

Walton found nothing to say until it was too 
late. Don approached the gymnasium after his 
ten o’clock recitation with lagging feet. He had 
scant taste for the impending interview and would 
have gladly avoided it if such a thing had been 
possible. But he didn’t see any way out of it and 
he heard the big door bang to behind him with 
a sinking heart. Why, he hadn’t even thought up 
any new excuse! 

Mr. Robey and Mr. Conklin, the athletic 
director, were both in the latter’s room when Don 
knocked at the half-opened door. Mr. Conklin 
said ‘ 4 Good-morning” and then followed it with: 
4 ‘I’ve got something to attend to on the floor, 
Robey, if you’ll excuse me,” and went out, closing 
the door behind him. Don wished he had stayed. 
He took the chair vacated by the director and 
faced Coach Robey with as much ease as he could 
assume, which was very little. The coach began 
without much preamble. 

“I didn’t ask you over here to talk about last 
night, Gilbert, or to offer you any apology for 
what I said on the field last Saturday. I don’t 


CROSS-EXAMINATION 


271 


believe much in spoken apologies. If I’m wrong 
I show it and there’s no mistake about it. I think 
I was wrong in your case, Gilbert. And I’ll say 
so, if you like, very gladly, and act so if you’ll 
prove it. ’ ’ 

“I don’t want any apology, sir,” answered 
Don. “I guess you were right enough.” 

“Well, that’s what I want to find out. What 
was the trouble, Gilbert?” 

“Why, just what I said, Coach. I—I didn’t 
feel very fit and I didn’t think it would be any 
use playing, feeling like I did. If you don’t feel 
well you can’t play very well, and so I thought I’d 
say so. I didn’t mind being dropped, sir. I de¬ 
served it. And—and that’s quite all right.” Don 
got up, his eyes shifting to the door. 

“Wait a minute! Let’s get the truth of this. 
You’re lying, aren’t you?” 

Don tried to look indignant and failed, tried to 
look hurt and failed again. Then he gave it up 
and dropped his gaze before the searching eyes 
of the other. “I’m feeling some better now,” he 
muttered. 

Coach Robey laughed shortly. “Gilbert, you 
can’t lie worth a cent! Now, look here. I’m 
your friend. Why not come across and tell me 
what’s up? I know you weren’t sick. Danny 


272 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


gave you a clean bill of health that morning. And 
I know you haven’t got any nerves to speak of. 
There’s something else, Gilbert. Now what is it V ’ 

“Nothing, sir.” 

“Then why did you act that way!” 

“I—I just didn’t want to play.” 

‘ ‘ Didn ’t want to play! Why not! ’ ’ 

“I wasn’t doing very well, and it was pretty 
hard work, and there was Walton after the place, 
too. He could play better than I could.” 

“Who told you so! Walton!” asked the coach 
drily. 

“I could see it,” murmured Don. 

“So you were suddenly afraid of hard work, 
eh! It had never bothered you before, had it! 
Last year or this year either!” 

“No, I guess not.” 

“Perhaps it was more because you felt that 
Walton would be a better man for the place, 
then!” surmised the coach. 

Don agreed eagerly. It was a case of any port 
in a storm by now and he was glad enough to have 
the coach find an explanation. “Yes, sir, I guess 
that was it.” 

“Well, that was generous of you,” said the 
other approvingly. “But didn’t it occur to you 
that perhaps I would be a better one to decide 


CROSS-EXAMINATION 


273 


that matter than you! You’ve never known me 
to keep a fellow on the team for sentimental rea¬ 
sons, have you!” 

“No, sir.” 

“Hm. Now when was it—I mean how long be¬ 
fore last Saturday was it—that you and Walton 
talked it over!” 

“Sir!” Don looked up startledly. “I—we— 
there wasn’t any talk about it,” he stammered. 

“Well, what did Walton say!” 

Don hesitated, studying Mr. Robey’s face in 
the hope of discovering how much that gentleman 
knew. Finally: “When do you mean!” he 
asked. 

“I mean the time you and Walton talked about 
which was the best man for the position,” replied 
the other easily. To himself he reflected that he 
was following Gus Proctor’s advice with a venge¬ 
ance! But he was by this time pretty certain 
of his ground. 

“I don’t remember that we ever—exactly did 
that,” Don faltered. “There was some talk, 
maybe, but he—he never said anything like that.” 

“Like what!” 

“Why, that he was a better guard.” 

“Then what put the idea in your head, Gil¬ 
bert!” 


274 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“I suppose I just saw it myself.” 

“But you were playing the position pretty reg¬ 
ularly before Thursday or whatever day it was 
you were taken ill, weren’t you?” 

“Yes, sir.” 

“Then how could you tell that Walton was bet¬ 
ter?” 

“I don’t know. He—he seemed better. And 
then Tim told me I was too slow.” 

“Tim Otis? Otis had better mind his own 
business,” grumbled the coach. “So that was it, 
then. All right. I’m glad to get the truth of the 
matter.” The little tightening of Don’s mouth 
didn’t escape him. “Now, then, I’m going to sur¬ 
prise you, Gilbert. I’m going to surprise you 
mightily. I’m going to tell you that Walton is not 
a better left guard than you. He isn’t nearly so 
good. That does surprise you, doesn’t it?” 

Don nodded, his eyes fixed uneasily on the 
coach’s. 

“Well, there it is, anyway. And so I think the 
best thing for all of us, Gilbert, is for you to come 
back to work this afternoon.” 

Don’s look of dismay quite startled the other. 

“But I’d rather not, sir! I—I’m out of prac¬ 
tice now. I’ve quit training. I’ve been eating all 
sorts of things; potatoes and fresh bread and 


CROSS-EXAMINATION 275 

pastry—no end of pastry, sir!—and—and 
candy-” 

Mr. Robey grunted. “You don’t show it,” he 
said. “Anyway, I guess that won’t matter. I’ll 
chance it. Three o ’clock, then, Gilbert. ’ ’ 

Don’s gaze sought the floor and he shook his 
head. “I’d rather not, sir, if you don’t mind,” 
he muttered. 

“But I do mind. The team needs you, Gilbert! 
And now that I know that you didn’t quit because 
you were afraid -” 

“I did, though!” Don looked up desperately. 
“That was the truth of it!” 

Mr. Robey sighed deeply. “Gilbert,” he said 
patiently, “if I couldn’t lie better than you can I 
wouldn’t try it! You weren’t afraid and you 
aren’t afraid and you know it and I know it! So, 
then, is it Walton?” 

After a moment Don nodded silently. 

“You think he’s a better man than you 
are, eh?” 

Don nodded again, but hesitatingly. 

“Or you’ve taken pity on him and want him to 
play against Claflin, perhaps.” 

“Yes, sir. You see, his folks are going to be 
here and they’ll expect him to play!” 

“Oh, I see. You and Walton come from the 


276 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


same town? But of course you don’t. How did 
you know his folks were coming, then?” 

“He told me.” 

“When?” 

“About—some time last week.” 

“Was it the day you had that talk about the 
position and which of you was to have it ? ” 

“I guess so. Yes, sir, it was that time.” 

“And he, perhaps, suggested that it would be 
a nice idea for you to back out and let him 
in, eh?” 

Don was silent. 

“Did he?” insisted the coach. 

“He said that his folks were coming-” 

“And that he’d like to get into the game so they 
wouldn’t be disappointed?” 

“Something like that,” murmured Don. 

“And you consented?” 

“Not exactly, but I thought it over and— 
and-” 

Mr. Robey suddenly leaned forward and laid 
a hand on Don’s knee. 

“Gilbert,” he asked quietly, “what has Walton 
got on yovfl” 


CHAPTER XXIV 


“ALL READY, BRUMFIELD?” 

Those who braved a chill east wind and went out 
that afternoon to watch practice enjoyed a sensa¬ 
tion, for when the first team came trotting over 
from the gymnasium, a half-hour later because of 
a rigorous signal quiz, amongst them, dressed to 
play, was Don Gilbert! A buzz of surprise and 
conjecture travelled through the ranks of the shiv¬ 
ering onlookers, that speedily gave place to satis¬ 
faction, and as Don, tossing aside his blanket, 
followed the first-string players into the field a 
small and enthusiastic First Form youth clapped 
approvingly, others took it up and in a moment 
the applause crackled along the side line. 

“That’s for you,” whispered Tim to Don. 
“Lift off your head-guard!” 

But Don glanced alarmedly toward the fringe 
of spectators and hid as best he could behind 
Thursby! Practice went with a new vim today. 
Doubtless the return of Don heartened the team, 
for one thing, and then there was a snap of win¬ 
ter in the air that urged to action. The second 
277 


278 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


was as nearly torn to tatters this afternoon as it 
had ever been, and the first scored twice in each 
of the two fifteen-minute periods. “Boutelle’s 
Babies ’’ were a lame and tired aggregation when 
the final whistle blew! 

Later it became known that Walton was out 
of it, had emptied his locker and retired from 
football affairs for the year. All sorts of stories 
circulated. One had it that he had quarrelled 
with Coach Robey and been incontinently ‘ 4 fired .’ 9 
Another that he had become huffy over Gilberts 
reinstatement and had resigned. None save Don 
and Coach Robey and Walton himself knew the 
truth of the matter for a long time. Don did tell 
Tim eventually, but that was two years later, when 
his vow of secrecy had lapsed. Just now he was 
about as communicative as a sphinx, and Tim’s 
eager curiosity had to go unsatisfied. 

“But what did he say?” Tim demanded after 
practice that afternoon. “He must have said 
something!” 

Don considered leisurely. 4 ‘ No, nothing special. 
He said I was to report for work.” 

“Well, what did you say!” 

“I said I would!” 

“Well, what about Walton! Where does he 
get off!” 


“ALL READY, BRIMFIELD?” 


279 


“I don’t know.” 

Tim gestured despairingly. “Gee, you’re cer¬ 
tainly a chatty party! Don’t tell me any more, 
please 1 You may say something you’ll be sorry 
for!” 

“I’ll tell you some day all about it, Tim. I 
can’t now. I said I wouldn’t.” 

“Then there is something to tell, eh? I knew 
it! You can’t fool your Uncle Dudley like that, 
Donald! Tell me just one thing and I’ll shut up. 
Did you and Walton have a row the time you 
went to see him in his room?” 

Don shook his head. “No, we didn’t.” 

“Well, then, why-” 

“You said you’d shut up,” reminded the 
other. 

“Oh, all right,” grumbled Tim. “Anyway, I’m 
mighty glad. Every fellow on the team is as 
pleased as Punch. I guess the whole school is, 
too. It was mighty decent of Robey, wasn’t it? 
Do you know, Don, Robey’s got a lot of sense 
for a football coach?” 

Don often wondered what had occurred and 
been said at the interview between Mr. Robey and 
Harry Walton. The coach had sworn Don to 
silence at the termination of their interview. “If 
Walton asks you whether you told me about the 


280 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


business you can say you did, if you like. Or tell 
him I wormed it out of you, which is just about 
what I did do. But don’t say anything to anyone 
else about it; at all events, not as long as Wal¬ 
ton’s here. I’m going to find him now and have 
a talk with him. I don’t think you need be at all 
afraid of anything he may do after I get through 
with him. You fellows clearly did wrong in out¬ 
staying leave that night, but yon had a fairly good 
excuse and if you’d had enough sense to go to 
faculty the next morning and explain you’d have 
all got off with only a lecture, I guess. Your mis¬ 
take was in not confessing. However, I don’t 
consider it my place to say anything. It’s an old 
story now, anyhow. Be at the gym at three with 
your togs, Gilbert, and do your best for us from 
now on. I’m glad to have you back again. What 
I said that afternoon you’d better forget. I’ll 
show the school that I’ve changed my mind about 
you. I suppose I ought to make some sort of an 
apology, but-” 

“Please don’t say anything more about it, sir,” 
begged Don. 

‘ 4 Well, I’ll say this, Gilbert: You acted like a 
white man in taking your medicine and keeping 
the others out of trouble. You certainly deserve 
credit for that.” 


“ALL READY, BRIMFIELD!” 281 

“I don’t see it,” replied the boy. “I don’t see 
what else I could have done, Mr. Robey!” 

The coach pondered a moment. Then he 
laughed. “I guess you’re right, at that! Just 
the same, you did what was square, Gilbert. All 
right, then. Three o’clock.” He held out his 
hand and Don put his in it, and the two gripped 
firmly. 

Hurrying back to Main Hall, Don regretted only 
one thing, which was that he had in a way broken 
his agreement with Walton to say nothing about 
their bargain. Coach Robey, though, had pointed 
out that the agreement had been terminable by 
either party to it, and that in confessing to him 
Don had been within his rights. “Walton can 
now go ahead and take the matter to faculty, as 
he threatened to do,” said the coach. “Only, 
when I get through talking to him I don’t think 
he will care to!” 

And apparently he hadn’t, for no dire summons 
reached Don from the office that day or the next, 
nor did he ever hear more of the matter. Walton 
displayed a retiring disposition that was new and 
novel. On such infrequent occasions as Don ran 
across him Walton failed to see him. The day of 
the game the latter was in evidence with his 
father, mother and younger brother; Don saw 


282 LEFT GUARD GILBERT 

him making the rounds of the buildings with them 
and he wondered in what manner Walton had 
accounted to his folks for his absence from the 
football team. Walton stayed on at school, very 
little in evidence, until Christmas vacation, but 
when the fellows reassembled after the recess he 
was not amongst them. Rumour had it that he 
had been taken ill and would not be back. 
Rumour was proved partly right, at all events, 
for Brimfield knew him no more. 

The first and second teams held final practice 
on Thursday. The first only ran through signals 
for awhile, did some punting and catching and 
then disappeared, leaving the second to play two 
fifteen-minute periods with a team composed of 
their own second-string and the first team’s third- 
string players. After that was over, the second 
winning without much effort, the audience, which 
had cheered and sung for the better part of an 
hour, marched back to the gymnasium and did it 
some more, and the second team, cheering most 
enthusiastically for themselves and the first and 
the school and, last but by no means least, for 
Mr. Boutelle, joyously disbanded for the season. 

There was another mass-meeting that evening, 
an intensely fervid one, followed by a parade 


“ALL READY, BRIMFIELD?” 


283 


about the campus and a good deal of noise that 
was finally quelled by Mr. Fernald when, in re¬ 
sponse to demands, he appeared on the porch of 
the Cottage and made a five-minute speech which 
ended with the excellent advice to return to hall 
and go to bed. 

The players didn’t attend the meeting that 
night, nor were they on hand at the one that took 
place the night following. Instead, they trotted 
and slithered around the gymnasium floor in rub¬ 
ber-soled shoes and went through their entire 
repertoire of plays under the sharp eyes of 
Coaches Robey and Boutelle. There was a black¬ 
board lecture, too, on each evening, and when, at 
nine-thirty on Friday, they were dismissed, with 
practice all over for the year, most of them were 
very glad to slide into bed as quickly as possible. 
If any of them had “the jumps’’ that night it was 
after they were asleep, for the coach had tired 
them out sufficiently to make them forget that 
such things as nerves were a part of their 
system! 

But the next morning was a different matter. 
Those who had never gone through a Claflin con¬ 
test were inclined to be finicky of appetite and to 
go off into trances with a piece of toast or a fork- 
full of potato poised between plate and mouth. 


284 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


Even the more experienced fellows showed some 
indication of strain. Thursby, for instance, who 
had been three years on the first team as substi¬ 
tute or first-choice centre, who had already taken 
some part in two Claflin games, and who was 
apparently far too big and calm to be affected by 
nerves, showed a disposition to talk more than 
was natural. 

Don never really remembered at all clearly how 
that Saturday morning passed. Afterward he 
had vague recollections of sitting in Clint 
Thayer’s room and hearing Amy Byrd rattle off 
a great deal of nonsensical advice to him and 
Clint and Tim as to how to conduct themselves 
before the sacrifice (Amy had insisted that they 
should line up and face the grand-stand before 
the game commenced, salute and recite the im¬ 
mortal line of Claudius’s gladiators: “Morituri 
te salutant !”); of seeing Manager Jim Morton 
dashing about hither and thither, scowling blackly 
under the weight of his duties; of wandering 
across to the woods beyond the baseball field with 
Tim Otis and Larry Jones and some others and 
sitting on the stone wall there and watching Larry 
take acorns out of Tim’s ears and nose; and, 
finally, of going through a perfectly farcical early 
dinner in a dining hall empty save for the mem- 


“ALL BEADY, BRIMFIELDT’ 285 

bers of the training-table. After that events stood 
out more clearly in his memory. 

Claflin’s hosts began to appear at about half¬ 
past one. They wore blue neckties and arm-bands 
or carried blue pennants which they had the good 
taste to keep furled while they wandered around 
the campus and poked inquisitive heads into the 
buildings. Then the Claflin team, twenty-six 
strong, rolled up in two barges just before two, 
having taken their dinner at the village inn, dis¬ 
embarked in front of Wendell and meandered 
around to the gymnasium laden with suit-cases 
and things looking insultingly care-free and 
happy, and, as it couldn’t be denied, particularly 
husky! 

Don, observing from the steps of Torrence, won¬ 
dered how they managed to appear so easy and 
careless. No one, as he confided to Tom Hall and 
Tim, would ever suspect that they were about to 
do battle for the Brimfield-Claflin championship! 

“Huh,” said Tom, “that’s nothing. That’s the 
way we all do when we go away to play. It’s this 
sticking at home and having nothing to do but 
think that takes the starch out of you. When you 
go off you feel as if you were on a lark. Things 
take your mind off your troubles. But, just the 
same, a lot of those grinning dubs are doing a 


286 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


heap of worrying about now. They aren’t nearly 
as happy as they look!” 

“ They ’re a lot happier than they’re going to he 
about three hours from now,” said Tim darkly. 
That struck the right note, and Tom and Don 
laughed, and Tim laughed with them, and they 
all three put their shoulders back and perked up 
a lot! 

And then it was two o’clock and they were pull¬ 
ing on their togs in the locker-room; and Danny 
Moore was circulating about in very high spirits, 
cracking jokes and making them laugh, and Coach 
Robey was dispatching Jim Morton and Jim’s 
assistant on mysterious errands and referring 
every little while to his red-covered memorandum 
book and looking very untroubled and serene. 
And then there was a clamping of feet on the 
stairs above and past the windows some two dozen 
pairs of blue-stockinged legs moved briskly as 
the visitors went across to the field for practice. 
And suddenly the noise was stilled and Coach 
Robey was telling them that it was up to them 
now, and that they hadn’t a thing in the world to 
do for the next two hours but knock the tar out of 
those blue-clad fellows, and that they had a fine 
day for it! And then, laughing hard and cheer¬ 
ing a little, they piled out and across the warm, 


“ALL READY, BRIMFIELD r’ 


287 


sunlit grass, past the line of fellow-students and 
home-folks and towners, with here and there a 
pretty girl to glance shyly and admiringly at them 
as they trotted by, and so to the bench. Nerves 
were gone now. They were only eager and im¬ 
patient. “Squads out!” sang Mr. Robey. Oft 
came sweaters and faded blankets and they were 
out on the gridiron, with Carmine and McPhee 
cheerily piping the signals, with their canvas legs 
rasping together as they trotted about, and with 
the Brimfield cheer so^mding in their ears, making 
them feel a little chokey, perhaps, but wonder¬ 
fully strong and determined and proud! 

And presently they were back in front of the 
bench, laughing at and pummelling one another, 
and the rival captains and the referee were watch¬ 
ing a silver coin turn over and over in the sun¬ 
light out there by the tee in midfield. Behind 
them the stand was packed and colourful. Be¬ 
yond, Brimfield was cheering lustily again. 
Across the faded green, at the end of the newly- 
brushed white lines, nearly a hundred Claflin 
youths were waving their banners and cheering 
back confidently. 

“Claflin kicks off,” sang Captain Edwards. 
“We take the west goal. Come on, fellows! 
Everyone on the jump now!” 


288 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


A long-legged Claflin guard piled the dirt up 
into a six-inch cone, laid the ball tenderly upon it, 
viewed the result, altered it, backed off and 
waited. 

“All ready, Claflin? All ready, Brinrfield^ , 
The whistle blew. 


CHAPTER XXV 


TIM GOES OVER 

Coach Robey put his best foot forward when the 
first period started by presenting the strongest 
line-up he had. Fortunately, Brimfield had 
reached the Claflin game with every first-string 
man in top shape, something that doesn’t often 
happen with a team. There was Captain Edwards 
at left end, Thayer at left tackle, Gilbert at left 
guard, Thursby at centre, Hall at right guard, 
Crewe at right tackle, Holt at right end, Carmine 
at quarter, St. Clair at left half, Otis at right 
half and Rollins at full. 

Opposed to them was a team fully their equal 
in age, weight and experience. The Claflin for¬ 
wards were a bit taller and rangier, and their cen¬ 
tre, unlike Thursby, was below rather than above 
average size. Behind their line, the four players 
were, with the exception of Grady, full-back, small 
and light. But they were known to be fast and 
heady and Claflin didn’t make the mistake of un¬ 
derestimating their ability. The left half, Cox, 
289 


290 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


was a broken-field runner of renown as well as 
Clafiin’s best goal-kicker. Perhaps it would have 
been difficult that fall to have picked two teams 
to oppose each other that were more evenly 
matched than those representing the Maroon-and- 
Grey and the Blue. 

For the first few minutes of play each eleven 
seemed to be feeling out its opponent. Two ex¬ 
changes of punts gained ground for neither side. 
Brimfield got her backfield working then on her 
twenty yards and St. Clair and Tim tried each 
side of the blue line and in two downs gained a 
scant six yards. Rollins punted out at Claflin’s 
forty-seven. The Blue got past Hall for two 
and slid off Holt for three more. The next rush 
failed and Claflin punted to Carmine on the fifteen. 
The Blue’s ends were down on Carmine and he 
was stopped for a five-yard gain. Rollins tried a 
forward pass to Edwards, but threw short and 
the ball grounded. Tim Otis ran the left end for 
four and, on a delayed pass, Rollins heaved him¬ 
self through centre for the distance, and Brimfield 
cheered loudly when the linesmen pulled up stakes 
and trailed the chain ten yards nearer the centre 
of the field. 

A second forward pass was caught by Holt, but 
he was brought down for a scant three-yard gain. 


TIM GOES OYER 


291 


Once more Rollins attempted the centre of the 
blue line, but this time he was stopped short. On 
third down Rollins punted and Claflin caught on 
her forty and ran the ball back to the middle of 
the field. Claflin then found Crewe for four yards 
and completed her distance on a straight plunge 
between Gilbert and Thayer. It was the Blue’s 
turn to cheer then and she performed valiantly. 
Claflin tried Edwards’s end, but made nothing of 
it, poked Cox past Crewe for a couple of yards, 
made three around Holt and then punted. St. 
Clair misjudged the distance and the ball went 
over his head and there was a scamper to the goal 
line. Carmine finally fell on the ball for a touch- 
back and the excitement in the stands subsided. 
Brimfield smashed Otis at the Blue’s centre and 
reached the twenty-five-yard line. St. Clair made 
three on a skin-tackle play at the right and Rollins 
got the distance on a plunge after a fake-kick. 
Brimfield again made first down on the forty-two 
yards and her supporters howled gleefully. A 
moment later they had new cause for rejoicing 
when Rollins pegged the ball across the field to 
Edwards and the Maroon-and-Grey’s captain 
scampered and dodged along the side of the field 
for thirteen yards before he was tackled. Time 
was called for a Claflin back and Brimfield drew 


292 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


off for a consultation, the result of which was seen 
in the next play. 

Carmine called Gilbert to the right side of cen¬ 
tre, the backs spread themselves in wide forma¬ 
tion ten yards behind the line and Steve Edwards, 
as the first signal began, ran back, straightened 
out as the ball was snapped, raced along behind 
his forwards and swept around his right end. 
Claflin’s right end and half-back plunged outside 
of Thayer, were met by St. Clair and Rollins, and 
Carmine, having taken the ball on a long pass from 
Thursby, raced past them and then swung quickly 
in and found an almost clear field ahead. 

Two white lines passed under his twinkling 
feet and then, near the twenty, he was challenged 
by a Claflin back. Carmine eluded him, crossed 
a third line, found himself confronted by the 
Blue’s quarter, attempted to slip by on the out¬ 
side, was tackled and borne struggling across the 
side line and deposited forcibly on the ground. 

When the ball was stepped in by the referee it 
was set down some four inches inside the fifteen- 
yard line. In the stands and along the side of the 
field Brimfield was cheering triumphantly, implor¬ 
ingly, and waving her banners. The linesmen 
scampered in obedience to the referee’s waving 


arm. 


TIM GOES OVER 


293 


“First down!” shouted the official. “All right, 
Brimfield? Ready, Claflin?” The whistle piped 
again. 

Rollins was stopped squarely on a try at right 
guard and Otis made a scant three past the left 
tackle. Under the shadow of her goal-posts, Claf- 
lin was digging her cleats in the turf and fighting 
hard. Rollins went back. ‘ ‘ Get through, Claflin! 
Block this kick!” cried the Blue’s quarter-back. 
“Get through! Get through I” Back went the 
ball from Thursby, a trifle high but straight 
enough, Rollins poised it, swung his leg, and then, 
tucking the pigskin under his arm, sprang away 
to the left. Shouts of alarm, cries of warning, 
the hurried rush of feet and rasping of canvas! 
Bodies crashed together and went down. Rollins, 
at the ten yards now, side-stepped and got past 
a blue-legged defender, turned in and went bang¬ 
ing straight into the melee. Arms clutched at him. 
He was stopped momentarily. Then he wrested 
free, plunged on for another yard and went to 
earth. 

“Second down!” cried the referee when he had 
bored through the pile of squirming bodies and 
found the ball. He glanced along the five-yard 
line, set the pigskin to earth again, and “About 
two feet to go! ” he added. Brimfield was shout- 


294 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


in g incessantly now, standing and waving. 
“Touchdown! Touchdown! Touchdown!” Across 
the field Claflin sent back a dogged chant: “Hold 
’em, Claflin! Hold ’em, Claflin! Hold ’em, Claf¬ 
lin!” 

But surely Claflin couldn’t do that! It seemed 
too much to ask or expect. Otis made it first down 
oft left tackle, placing the ball on the three yards. 
Before the next play could be started the period 
ended and the teams flocked to the water pails and 
then tramped down to the other end of the field. 
The cheering never paused, even if the playing 
did. Childers, red-faced and perspiring, kept the 
Brimfield section busy every instant. “Once 
more, now ! A long cheer with nine ‘ Brimfields ’! 
That’s good! Keep it up! We’re going to score, 
fellows! Let’s have it again! All into it! ” 

Only three yards to go and four downs to do 
it! Claflin lined up desperately, her forwards dig¬ 
ging their toes barely inside their last line, her 
backfield men skirmishing anxiously about behind 
it. “Push ’em back, Claflin! You can do it! 
Don’t give ’em an inch! Stop ’em right here, fel¬ 
lows! Low, low, get low, you fellows! Charge 
into ’em and smother this play!” The Claflin 
quarter, pale of face, thumped crouching backs 
and watched the foe intently. 


TIM GOES OVER 295 

“Put it over now!” shrilled Carmine. “Here 
we go! Get down there, Hall! Signals!’ ’ 

Rollins leaped forward, took the ball from Car¬ 
mine and smashed straight ahead. There was a 
moment of doubt. His plunging body stopped, 
went on, stopped, was borne back. 

11 Second down! Two and a half to go! ” 

Again the signals, the line shifted, Claflin 
changed to meet the shift. St. Clair slewed across 
and slammed past the Claflin left tackle. But the 
secondary defence had him in the next instant 
and he was thrust, fighting, back and still back. 
But he had gained. “A yard and a half!” pro¬ 
claimed the referee. 

“You’ve got to do it, Brimfield!” shouted Ed¬ 
wards intensely. “Don’t let them get the jump 
on you like that! Get into it, Crewe! Watch that 
man, Gilbert! Come on now! Put it over! ’ ’ 
“Signals!” shrieked Carmine. “Make it go 
this time! Over with it! ” 

Back went Rollins, hands outstretched. “Fake!” 
shouted Claflin. “Watch the ball! Watch the 
ball!” 

Rollins’s arms fell, empty, as St. Clair grabbed 
the pigskin and swept wide to the right. “In! 
In!” cried Carmine. St. Clair turned and shot 
toward the broken line. His interference did its 


296 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


part, but the Claflin left end had fooled Holt and 
it was that bine-legged youth who got St. Clair 
and thumped him to the sod. An anxious, breath¬ 
less moment followed. Brimfield called for time 
and St. Clair, on his back, kicked and squirmed 
while they pumped the air back into his lungs. 
The referee, kneeling over the ball, squinted along 
the line. Then: 

4 ‘Fourth down and about two to go!” he an¬ 
nounced. 

St. Clair had lost a half-yard! Claflin cheered 
weakly. Steve Edwards and Carmine con¬ 
sulted. 

“We’d better kick it over,” said Carmine. 
“They’re getting the jump on us every time, 
Steve.” Carmine’s voice was husky and he had 
to gasp his words out. Steve, panting like an 
engine, shook his head. 

“We need the touchdown,” he said. “We’ll 
put it over. Try 11. Tim can make it.” 

St. Clair walked back to his place. The whistle 
sounded again. “Come on, Brimfield!” gasped 
Carmine. “This is your last chance! If you 
don’t do it this time you’ll never do it! Play like 
you meant it! Stop your fooling and show ’em 
football! Every man into this and make it got 
Hall over! Signals!” Hall pushed his way to 


TIM GOES OVER 297 

the left of the line. Claflin shuffled to meet the 
change. <‘Signals! 83—38—11—106!” 

“Signals!” cried St. Clair. Carmine turned on 
him, snarling. ‘ 1 Use your bean! Change signals! 
Hall over! 61—16—11—37! 61—16—11 ’ ’ 

Back shot the ball to the quarter. Off sped St. 
Clair around his end, followed by Rollins. Car¬ 
mine crouched, back to the line, while he counted 
five. Then Tim Otis shot forward, took the de¬ 
layed pass, jammed the ball against his stomach 
and went in past Thursby on the right. 

Tim struck the line as if shot out of a gun. 
There was no hole there, but Tim made one. If 
the secondary defence, overanxious, had not been 
fooled by that fake attack at their end Tim would 
never have gained a foot. But as it was Claflin 
was caught napping in the centre of her line. Tim 
banged against a brawny guard, Carmine, follow¬ 
ing him through, added impetus, the Claflin line 
buckled inward! Shouts and grunts, stifled groans 
of despair from the yielding blue line! Then 
Brimfield closed in behind Tim and he was borne 
off his feet and on and over to fall at last in a 
chaos of struggling bodies well across the goal 
line! 

The ball went over to the right of the goal and 
Carmine decided on a punt-out. Unfortunately, 


298 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


Thayer juggled the catch and so Brimfield lost her 
try-at-goal. But six points looked pretty big just 
then and continued to look big all the rest of the 
half and during the succeeding intermission. 
Brimfield’s supporters were confident and happy. 
They sang and cheered and laughed, and the sun, 
sinking behind the wooded ridge, cast long golden 
beams on the flaunting maroon banners. 

And then the teams came trotting back once 
more and cheers thundered forth from opposing 
stands. Howard had taken St. Clair’s place, it 
was seen, and Claflin had replaced her right guard. 
But otherwise the teams were unchanged. Brim- 
field kicked off and Claflin brought her supporters 
to their feet by running the ball back all the way 
to the forty-five-yard line. That was Cox, the 
fleet-footed and elusive, and the Blue’s left half 
got a mighty cheer from his friends and generous 
applause from the enemy. After that Claflin tried 
a forward pass and gained another down, and 
then, from near the middle of the field, marched 
down to Brimfield’s thirty-three before she was 
stopped. The Maroon-and-Grey got the ball on 
downs by an inch or two only. 

Brimfield tried the Claflin ends out pretty thor¬ 
oughly and with Otis and Howard carrying, took 
back most of Claflin’s gain. But a forward pass 


TIM GOES OYER 


299 


finally went to a Clafiin end instead of Holt and 
the tables were suddenly turned. It was the 
Blue’s ball on Brimfield’s forty-six then, and 
Clafiin opened her bag of tricks. Just how Cox 
got through the centre of the Brimfield line no one 
ever explained satisfactorily, but get through he 
did, and after he was through he romped past Otis 
and Rollins and raced straight for the goal. Car¬ 
mine and Howard closed in on him and it was 
Carmine who brought him down at last on the 
twelve yards. 

How Clafiin shouted and triumphed then! The 
Blue came surging down the field to line up 
against the astounded enemy, determination writ¬ 
ten large on every countenance. A plunge at Gil¬ 
bert gained a yard and was followed by a three- 
yard gain off: Holt. Then Clafiin fumbled and re¬ 
covered for a two-yard loss and, with eight to go 
on fourth down, decided that a goal from field 
was the best try. And, although Brimfield tried 
hard to get through to the nimble-footed Cox, and 
did smear the Blue’s line pretty fairly, the ball 
went well and true across the bar, and the 0 on 
the score-board was changed to a 3! 


CHAPTEB XXVI 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 

That finished the scoring in the third period. All 
that Claflin could do was to bring back Brimfield’s 
punts and try desperately to find holes in the 
maroon-and-grey line that weren’t there. Both 
teams were showing the effects of hard playing, 
and when the third quarter ended substitutes were 
hurried in from both benches. For Brimfield, 
McPhee relieved Carmine, Lee went in for Holt 
and Sturges for Crewe. Claflin put in a new right 
end, a fresh full-back and returned her original 
right guard to the line-up. 

McPhee brought instructions from Coach 
Bobey. Brimfield was to hold what she had and 
play the kicking game. If she got within the 
Blue’s thirty-yard line she was to let Bollins try 
a drop-kick. 

Bollins punted regularly on second down and 
just as regularly Claflin rushed until the fourth 
and then punted hack. After five minutes of play, 
during which the ball went back and forth from 
one thirty-yard line to the other, it dawned on 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


301 


Claflin that she was making no progress. A new 
full-back trotted in and displayed his ability by 
sending the ball over McPhee’s head on his first 
attempt. Fortunately, though, the punt, while 
long, was much too low, and McPhee had plenty of 
time to go after the pigskin, gather it in and run 
back a dozen yards before the Claflin ends reached 
him. But after that McPhee played further back 
and Rollins put still more power into his drives. 

With almost ten minutes of the final period 
gone, Claflin, grown desperate, tried what forward 
passing would do. The first time, she lost the 
ball to Thayer, and Clint got ten yards before he 
was thrown, but the second attempt went better 
and Cox, who made the catch, ran across three 
white lines and only stopped when Edwards 
dragged him down from behind. Claflin got an¬ 
other first down by two plunges at the right of the 
opponent’s line and a wide end-run. Then a pen¬ 
alty set her back fifteen yards and she had to 
punt after two ineffectual attempts at rushing. 
Otis got through for five yards and then Rollins 
punted again. 

The head linesman announced five minutes to 
play. On the stands the spectators were begin¬ 
ning to depart. Claflin was back on her thirty- 
five yards, banging desperately at the maroon- 


302 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


and-grey line, desperately and a bit hopelessly. 
A forward pass was knocked down by Captain 
Edwards, an assault at the left of the Brimfield 
line was smeared badly, Cox tried the other end 
and was laid low for a loss. Claflin punted. 

Howard, on a double pass, swept around the 
enemy’s left for fifteen yards and then squirmed 
past tackle for six more. Rollins kicked to Claf¬ 
lin *s ten and Edwards nailed the Blue’s quarter 
before he could move. Brimfield cheered encour¬ 
agingly. But Claflin, after getting four around 
Sturges, punted out of danger to Brimfield’s 
forty-seven. 

‘ 4 Three minutes!” announced the timekeeper. 

Otis got two at centre and Rollins again fell 
back to kick. The ball came to him low and he 
juggled it. Claflin poured through the right of 
the line, the ball bounded back from some up- 
thrown arm and went dancing along the field. 
Blue players and maroon dashed after it. Hall 
almost had it, but was toppled aside by a Claflin 
man. Carmine dived for it and missed. Then 
Tim Otis and a Claflin forward dropped upon it 
simultaneously and struggled for its possession. 
Tim always maintained that he got more of it 
than his opponent, and got it first, but the referee 
awarded it to Claflin and dismayedly Brimfield 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 303 

gathered together and lined up only twenty yards 
from her goal! 

“Two minutes, fellows!” shouted the Claflin 
quarter-back exultantly. “We’ve got time to do 
it! Come on now, come on! We can win it right 
now! All together, Claflin! We’ve got them on 
the run! They ’re all-in! They ’re ready to quit! ’ ’ 

The Claflin full-hack faked a kick and circled 
around Lee’s end for a six-yard gain. Then the 
Blue’s right half plugged the line and got three 
more past Hall. It was one to go on third down. 
Another attack on Hall was pushed back, but Claf¬ 
lin made it first down by sending Cox squirming 
around Thayer. The ball was on the eleven yards 
now. It was Brimfield’s turn to know the fear of 
defeat. Edwards implored and bullied. Claflin 
banged at Gilbert for a yard. A quarter-back run 
caught Steve Edwards napping and put the pig¬ 
skin on the seven yards. Brimfield’s adherents, 
massed along the side line,, shouted defiantly. 
Across the darkening, trampled field, the Claflin 
cohorts were imploring a touchdown. 

‘ 1 Third down! Six to go! ” shouted the referee, 
hurrying out of the way. 

“On side, Claflin right end and tackle!” warned 
the umpire. 

The signals came again and the Claflin full-back 


304 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


smashed into the left of the opposing team. But 
it was like striking a stone wall that time. Per¬ 
haps the ball nestled a few inches nearer the goal, 
but no more than that. It was Don who bore the 
brunt of that attack and after the piled-up bodies 
had been pulled aside he and the Claflin full-back 
remained on the ground. On came the trainers 
with splashing buckets. Don came to with the 
first swash of the big, smelly sponge on his face. 
Danny Moore was grinning down at him. 

“Are ye hurt?” he asked. 

Don considered that a moment. Then he shook 
his head. “I’m—alt right,—Danny,” he mur¬ 
mured. ‘ ‘ Just—help me—up. ’ ’ 

“Don’t be in a hurry. Take all the time the law 
allows ye.” Danny’s fingers travelled inquiringly 
over the boy’s body. “Where do you feel it?” he 
asked. 

Don kept his eyes stoically on the trainer’s. If 
he flinched a little when Danny’s strong fingers 
pressed his right shoulder it was so little that the 
trainer failed to see it. Nearby, the Claflin full¬ 
back was already on his feet. Tim came over and 
knelt by the trainer’s side. 

“Anything wrong, Don?” he asked in a tired, 
anxious voice. 

“Not a thing,” replied Don cheerfully. “Give 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 305 

me a hand, will you? I’m sort of wabbly, I 
guess.” 

On the side line Pryme, head-guard in hand, 
was trotting up and down. Coach Robey was look¬ 
ing across intently. Don shook himself, stretched 
his arms—no one ever knew what that cost him!— 
and trotted around a few steps. Then, out of the 
corner of his eyes, he saw the coach say some¬ 
thing to Pryme, saw the disappointed look on the 
substitute’s face and was half sorry for him. The 
whistle blew again and Don was crouching once 
more beside Thursby—why, no, it wasn’t Thursby 
any longer! It was Peters, stout, complacent 
Peters, wearing a strangely fierce and ugly look 
on his round countenance! 

“Now hold ’em, Brimfield!” chanted McPhee. 
“Hold ’em hard! Don’t let them have an inch!” 

Far easier said than done, though! A quick 
throw across the end of the line, a wild scramble 
and jumble of arms, a faint “Down!” and, at the 
right end of the Brimfield line, a mound of bodies 
with the ball somewhere down beneath and to all 
appearances across the goal line! Anxious mo¬ 
ments then! One by one the fallen warriors were 
pulled to their feet while into the pile dove the 
referee. The timekeeper hovered nearby, watch 
in hand. Then the referee’s voice: 


306 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


“ Claflin’s ball! First down! A foot to go!” 

* ‘ Line-up! Line-up!’ ’ shrieked the Claflin quar¬ 
ter. ‘‘ We Ve got time yet! Put it over!’’ 

“ Fight, Brimfield!” shouted Steve Edwards. 

‘‘There’s only forty seconds! Hold them off! 
Don’t let them get it! Tom! Peters! Don! Get 
into it now !’ 9 

‘ 1 Signals! Signals! ’ 9 

Then a moment of silence save for the gasping 
breath of the players. The Claflin quarter shouted 
his signals, the ball sped back, the lines heaved. 
Straight at the left guard position plunged the 
back. “Stop him!” growled Peters. The sec¬ 
ondary defence leaped to the rescue. Back went 
the man with the ball. “Down!” he cried in 
smothered tones. The referee pushed in and 
heeled the mark. 

1 ‘ Second down! A foot and a half to go ! 9 9 

Don knew now that if he had fooled Danny 
Moore he had not fooled the Claflin quarter-back. 
That quarter knew or guessed that he had been 
hurt and was playing for him. Don gritted his 
teeth and ground his cleats into the sod. Well, 
they’d see! 

The signals again, broken into by Steve Ed¬ 
wards ’s shrill voice in wild appeal. Steve was well- 
nigh beside himself now. Peters was growling 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


307 


like a bear in a cage. Then again the plunge, hard 
and quick, the whole Claflin backfield behind it! 
Don felt an intolerable pain as he pushed and 
struggled. Despair seized him for an instant, for 
he was being borne back. Then someone hurtled 
into him from behind, driving the breath from his 
lungs, and he was staggering forward. 

Peters was yanking him to his feet, a wild-eyed 
Peters mouthing strange exultant words. “They 
can’t do it! No, never! Not if they were to try 
all night! We put ’em back again, Gilbert! We’ll 
do it again! Come on, you blue-legged babies! 
Try it again! You ’ll never do it! ” 

Don, dazed, swaying giddily, groped back to his 
place. Thayer was muttering, too, now. Don 
wondered if they were all crazy. He was quite 
certain that he was, for otherwise things wouldn’t 
revolve around him in such funny long sweeps. 
Then his mind was suddenly clear again. The 
Claflin quarter was hurling his signals out hur¬ 
riedly, desparingly, fighting against time. Don 
didn’t listen to those signals for he knew where 
the attack would come. And he was right, for 
once more the blue right guard and tackle sprang 
at him to bear him back. And then the runner 
smashed into sight, wild-faced for an instant be¬ 
fore he put his head down and charged in. But 


308 


LEFT GUARD GILBERT 


Don didn’t yield. Peters, roaring londly, was 
fighting across him, and, front and rear, reinforce¬ 
ments hurled themselves into the melee. Don 
closed his eyes, every muscle in his body straining 
forward. A roar of voices came to him only dimly. 
Ages passed. 


He wondered if Danny Moore had nothing bet¬ 
ter to do than eternally swab his face with that 
beastly old sponge! Why didn’t he pick on some 
other fellow? Don felt quite aggrieved and tried 
to say so, but couldn’t seem to make any sound. 
Then he realised that he had forgotten to open his 
lips. When he did he got a lot of cold water in his 
mouth and that made him quite peevish. He tried 
to raise his right hand, changed his mind about it 
and raised his left instead. With that he pushed 
weakly at the offending sponge. 


“Take it away,” he muttered. “I’m 
drowned. ’ ’ 

“Can you walk or will we carry you?” asked 
Danny in businesslike tones. 

“Walk,” said Don indignantly. “Let me up.” 
Recollection returned. “Did they make it?” he 
gasped. 

* ‘ They did not. Lie still a bit. ’ ’ 

“Yes, but-” Don’s voice grew faint and he 





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